The Jury Room

A recent report from the Pew Research Center focused on the partisan differences in various television news networks audiences. Specifically, they reported that Fox News attracts more Republicans while CNN and MSNBC attract more Democrats. We were not shocked.  An interesting caveat to this preference was that more Democrats listen to Fox News than Republicans listen to CNN or MSNBC.  Again, we were not shocked.

An earlier Pew report looked at print media and reported that Republicans view the New York Times negatively by a margin of roughly 2:1 while Democrats see NYT positively by a 5:1 margin. Republicans like the Wall Street Journal and Democrats tend to like WSJ as well. When asked about radio news, NPR is also liked by both Democrats and Republicans (although Democrats like it a bit more).

So what does this have to do with litigation advocacy?

A lot. As a litigator on either side of the aisle, your task is to reach across the cultural divide and appeal to the hearts and minds of your jury.  Including the ones that are not predisposed to love your case.

• That means knowing what and how ‘they’ think.
• It means knowing what buzzwords open some minds and close others.
• It can mean either avoiding those buzzwords or strategically using them.
• It means tapping into universal values while avoiding landmines that elicit opposition to your client.

How do you do all those things? A simple way might be tuning into either Fox or CNN/MSNBC depending on what your normal viewing/listening preferences are (do the opposite).

• Learn what “they” are thinking.
• Identify strategies to make your presentation more broadly appealing.
• Identify what you would do/say if you were opposing counsel. How would you counter that interpretation in your case presentation?
• How does your specific fact pattern play into the partisan divide in our country? What underlying values appeal to all of us?
• What specific words do you need to avoid?
• What images do you want to refrain from evoking?
• Think of your language as evoking ‘we’ not ‘they’ or ‘us against them’ images.

In short, do what those Democrats who are listening to Fox News are probably doing: know the opposition perspective and use that knowledge to inform your approach.

Related posts:

1. “Reactions vary along traditional partisan lines”
2. Simple Jury Persuasion: Got charisma?
3. An uncivil union: Being ‘heard’
4. Questions, rabbit trails and how to know when a bear is “disturbed”