and I might argue there are plenty of women entrepreneurs and business leaders who never did this. Other hoop jumping (unfairly/justly yes)…but not this. It really is a bizarre choice on her part.
There’s a running gag on Tom Scharpling’s “the best show” about him using a voice modulator to make his voice sound deeper. I thought the reference was out of thin air and then I happened upon a youtube vlogger who was actually obviously modulating his voice for his videos. So weird.
I find her wearing of the Steve Jobs mock turtleneck to be more disturbing than the voice. It seems to me that she felt that by emulating these aspects of other successful people, she would become successful herself.
In comparison to Jobs, I find it fascinating that nowhere have I been able to find any mention at all of how she thought that it was possible to achieve the thing she was pushing for, the extraction of accurate diagnostic information from tiny drops of blood. Jobs at least could see a technological path to the insanely great computers he imagined, and was able to get results from his staff because the thing he wanted to do was within the realm of physical possibility.
[end of engineer rant]
As a women in a male dominated STEM field, I’m pretty conscientious of my tone when speaking in professional settings. Being “shrill”, up talking, vocal fry, are all things that are used to judge and discount especially younger women. I had an older colleague come to me after a staff meeting to lecture me on my tone and use of filler words, and told me that I needed to work on it to be taken more seriously.
For all of this woman’s faults, I can’t get on board with this one.
Not to ‘womansplain’ to you or anything, but try googling “vocal fry.”
The petty criticisms that women face in male dominated work fields is fucking ridiculous, as you may have already guessed…
And of course when we do it, we get all kinds of hell for it as well…
in reply to @Gelato
I have every understanding of this part of it. No splainin’ needed (or apologies on doing so).
Her “normal” voice is already fairly deep as it is… so I think this is partially why it is a bizarre choice on her part.
Guy here. With average male voice. I’ve also been given similar advice after public presentations. Speed, timbre, inflection. Part of your job as a speaker is to provide a pleasant listening experience to the audience. In the same way there are generally pleasant and unpleasant singing voices – and they can be improved with practice – there are also pleasant and unpleasant speaking voices which can improve with practice.
But hey! Everyone keep piling on this woman. While every moment of her life was a fraud, it was her funders that were the real criminals. Would be a shame if anyone noticed that.
‘Deep’ is in the ear of the beholder, methinks.
fair enough. And as you know I am not commenting on how other people think/feel…I am posting on MY thoughts and interpretations.
Having watched “Out for blood” I am rather aghast that she is the one being held most accountable for the failure of this entire thing. Was it her baby/brain child…sure. But there were multiple people (notably men) who are as liable for the failure as her.
Kind of like blaming the Fyre festival entirely on Billy Mcfarland. In both cases, its a majority blame, but certainly not 100%.
For what it’s worth:
Television critic Clive James, writing in The Observer prior to her election as Conservative Party leader, compared her voice of 1973 to “a cat sliding down a blackboard”.[nb 2] Thatcher had already begun to work on her presentation on the advice of Gordon Reece, a former television producer. By chance, Reece met the actor Laurence Olivier, who arranged lessons with the National Theatre’s voice coach. (source below)
Yeah, I agree with the other posters. Women’s opinions have been consistently shown to be devalued if they sound “too feminine”, and as a result they have to lower their voice to be taken seriously. “Vocal fry”, i think its called. Pretty disgusting situation.
Holmes did a LOT of shitty shit, but Im not sure this qualifies as one.
Agreed that changing a vocal register hardly counts as “fake”. But I can’t help but wonder what her voice sounded like after a hit or two of MDMA out on the playa:
Definitely not just a thing done by women. When I was a kid I remember my dad had a book “Change your voice, change your life”. He’d always answer the phone about two octaves lower than his normal voice…which would then relax back to normal once he found the person on the line was not a client. I’m not convinced it helped him, though.
I resist commenting on Holmes’s generally weird affect and self-presentation, but since you mention it, aren’t her pupils pretty well dilated in a lot of media pix of her? Are they just catching here that way, or was she constantly tripping?
So, ever since I heard about vocal fry, i cannot stop hearing it (on the news radio, etc.) It drives me nuts. Are we supposed to support or fight against vocal fry? (serious question)
Um… I honestly dunno.
Personally, I get most of my news from various reputable websites.
I don’t listen to any newsradio, or any radio music programs… or much of anything audio, at all if I can help it; because all the hyper-intense marketing of the last 3 decades has had an unintended adverse effect on me - I can’t stand ads, or listening to any voice that is obviously modulated to try to dominate my attention.
(Maybe it started with that irksome MovieFone guy, who knows?)
But to try to answer your question, it seems like the answer would be to fix society so that people are not judged on superficial bullshit; so they don’t end up having to jump through such ridiculous hoops like intentional voice modulation, just to be taken seriously.
But that’s way easier said than done, obviously.
It’s not really a support or fight issue, and more just an issue of self reflection to determine if you are judging someone based on the content of their statement or the presentation. Accents and regional/subculture linguistic ticks have been used to discount the ideas of marginalized groups for ages.
So in this specific case, it’s about setting aside her intentionally dropped tone, and evaluating the content which is what was fraudulent.
