Obedience To Authority In 12 Angry Men

From watching 12 Angry Men, it raises the question of what are the factors that influence the choices we make and the actions we take? 12 Angry Men was about a trial of an 18 year old boy who was accused murdering his father. He was accused of stabbing his father in the chest with a pocket knife. The judge commanded that the jury needs to come up with a decision as to whether or not the verdict (the boy) was guilty or not. If the jury pleaded guilty, the boy would face the death penalty. At first everyone but one person pleaded guilty. As the movie progressed, more and more of the jury were convinced that the boy was not guilty and eventually the jury decided that the boy was not guilty. To come up with this conclusion, the jury was not able to come up with …show more content…
Obedience to authority is defined as a social influence in which an individual follows explicit instructions and orders from an authoritative figure. For example, in the beginning scene, the judge commanded that the jury must bring a non guilty verdict or else the verdict would face the death penalty. This is an example of obedience to authority because the jury has to listen the judge due to the fact that they have the most authority in the court during the trial. The jury has to obey the judge's wishes by coming up with a conclusion as to whether or not the suspect is guilty or not guilty. Another example from the movie is when the jury did their first vote of how many people thought the boy was guilty and how many thought that the boy was not guilty of his killing his father. Most people in the jury voted the suspect as guilty, so anyone who does not know will vote guilty to prevent controversy between the people who think the boy is guilty. Lastly, another example is when the 12 men (jury) would yell at each other. The person who yelled at everyone, would get everyone’s attention and stop everyone else from