Lesson n°10, “Beware of prejudices”, comes from the tirade by juror n°10, a stalwart of the “guilty camp”.
This is a very powerful scene, where, even those “on the same side” as juror n°10 slowly take their distance by either moving away or turning their backs.
After his tirade, juror n°8 is the first to speak; he could easily have criticised juror n°10 for being bigoted, instead he simply says, “It’s very hard to keep personal prejudice out of a thing like this, and no matter where you run into it, prejudice obscures the truth”
I would reformulate the last part of the quote to say “prejudice obscures doubt”; there is often no “one truth” and prejudices often stop as seeing alternatives or possibilities that, when combined, could lead to a collective truth.
I help people to develop their interpersonal skills, usually within a leadership or teamwork context. If you are looking to develop your leadership, I might be able to help. I’ve been doing this for almost 40 years; roughly four thousand days of seminars, workshops, conferences, coaching, offsites, webinars, etc. – put back-to-back that makes almost ten “full” years.