Cliff told us he had been a jury foreman. It's interesting to see people betray their desire to get off the jury, or to get on the jury, in the way they answer the question. Cliff brought up that military service is often a required civic duty. In Heinlein's Starship Troopers, it's a requirement for citizenship - something that gets called out by the movie of the same title.
Morgan noted that jury duty is a key part of our justice system. Whether you get a jury of your peers, though, depends on who you are. Some people are released from jury duty because it is a significant hardship to be so inadequately compensated ($15/day). This means that the people who pursue this duty tend to be people of financial means, which influences the perspectives held by jurors. The cost in childcare and lost wages for some people is too high.
Kat noted that the kind of people who end up being on trial are less likely to have a jury of their peers.
Cliff mentioned that the Peace Corps is a body intended to promote a sense of global civic duty. It too skews toward rich people. It's idealistic in some good ways but shuts out people of low socioeconomic status, and can be seen as "the good cop of Empire" or even as a secular missionary program. If you were worldbuilding, trying to create an organization similar to the Peace Corps, make sure to consider the consequences of power structures you create - negative as well as positive.
Should vaccination be considered a civic duty? It is roped into the capitalist system in a potentially unhealthy way because one must either pay for vaccination or indicate an inability to pay.
In some social systems, someone is assigned to your welfare so there is no need for self-advocacy.
In Ursula K. LeGuin's The Lathe of Heaven, everyone is given a Pharmacy Card, and if you are found to be abusing the card, you get assigned a therapist.
The United Sates makes civic duty difficult to do. Voting is a civic duty, and governments often take deliberate steps to restrict it. We may talk about the importance of civic duty, but the only easy one is military service, via the high school Draft for men. If everything were as easy as joining the military, we'd have a very different culture.
Countries that require mandatory service exist - but this service need not necessarily be military. Israel and Switzerland both require such service. You have options of doing other things rather than using a gun.
Kat told us that the one thing that tempted her to join the military was access to the Language Institutes in Monterey, where you can get intensive training in all kinds of world languages, and not be restricted to those most commonly studied.
The US Draft is run via the post office, where you give your name and address. Your eligibility for financial aid can be tied to this registry.
It's important to look at why we make it difficult to participate in civic duties. People who want to give to the community are often constrained, especially if they are not members of a church or incredibly rich. Camp counseling is one way to give service. Civic duty has fallen off as a cultural norm in the US.
Kat wondered if it was the Vietnam War that broke the national will to civic service.
To what bodies, organizations or institutions do we owe our service? This is a critical question to ask if you are worldbuilding. Is it your species you owe service to? Your planet? Your city-state? Your neighborhood garden? Some schools require volunteering. Others require donations.
PTO/PTA parent organizations that support schools play an important role, but they too are organizations for "parents of leisure," and concentrate resources at schools with parents who have time and money. They also hide the inadequacy of school funding.
This discussion links back to the question of charity vs. justice, which we discussed at a previous hangout. The US valorizes charity but it would be more broadly effective to provide economic justice. Even charity can be discouraged, as when people who feed the homeless are criminalized. You can be penalized for not conforming to inadequate government structures. You can't give food away; people use the food safety rules in bad faith to criminalize food giveaways.
What function is actually being served by the institutions we create? Is the world we are creating designed as intended? Or are we recreating things we haven't examined enoug?
In the US, we don't make it easy to be informed enough to make decisions. There are constant economic barriers to participation.
In Japan, sense of civic duty is highly encouraged, and kids even clean their own schools. This is very effective in getting people to feel responsibility for their own environment, but culturally would not be feasible in the US. Somehow, people with money would find a way to get out of it and put the burden back on others of low socioeconomic status.
In Australia, polling places are quite widely variable, and you are allowed to do things like hold bake sales and sell "democracy sausages" for people who have voted. The offerings at a polling place may be halal or otherwise different depending on the demographics of the surrounding area. This is not allowed in the US.
How many languages are on your "I VOTED" sticker?
Some people consider a heterosexual monogamous marriage and children to be civic duties.
Is buying or spending a civic duty? Could strikes or boycotts be considered bad for civic duty? Is there such a thing as civic withdrawal?
There is a special allotment system in England for community gardens.
Some cultures have turned it in to a civic duty to educate children. This was not always the case. Is churchgoing a civic duty? Is tithe considered a religious duty, a civic duty, or both? Some countries, like Germany and France, have tithe as a part of taxes - but now you are starting to be able to opt out of it.
What aspects of civic duty are locally driven? Is proper water management a civic duty for example? Is not overusing drains in thaw time a civic responsibility?
Is parenting a civic duty?
Culture clash can definitely influence civic duty because of differing expectations of behavior. People who grow up with different governments will be trained into different expectations.
What are the norms of personal interaction for using public spaces? Sidewalks? Roads? Can those be considered civic duty?
Kat told us how Japan has an intense recycling culture with lots of cleaning and sorting into various categories; in the US, some communities don't provide recycling at all.
Civic duties can be innovated. There was an anti-littering campaign in the 1970's that arose from environmentalism. It led to a decline in trash, and to programs like sponsoring a road for cleaning. There were ads with characters like Woodsy Owl.
What government wants to influence your behavior, and why? Australia has very stringent anti-smoking rules because smoking leads to drastically increased costs for the nationalized health care system. France has an anti-soda campaign.
Among the Amish, barn-raising was a civic duty for members of the community.
There was a Star Trek episode with warring planets that had developed to the point of dropping simulated bombs on each other, and it was your civic duty to be disintegrated if you had been "killed" by the virtual bomb. This asks the question: could death be a civic duty? Is it fair to ask soldiers to expect their careers to end in death?
This was a really interesting discussion. Thank you to everyone who participated. Dive into Worldbuilding will meet this week on Tuesday, February 26th at 4pm Pacific to discuss Footwear (part 2!). Just when you thought you couldn't get enough of shoes...
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