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From Inside Voice: Lake Bell and the Sexy Baby Voice Phenomenon · Revisionist History

• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Pushkin.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: Hello, Hello, Revisionist history listeners.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello, Revisionist history listeners.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: History Listeners, Hello, Hello, Revisionist History Listeners.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: That didn't sound quite right, did it. It's got to
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: be more like this. Hello, Hello, Revisionist History Listeners. I'm
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: quite grateful that our loyal fans like the sound of
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: my voice. But why is that? My dear friend, The actress, director, writer,
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: producer Lake Bell is obsessed with people's voices, and frankly,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: I'm a little obsessed with Lake. So it made sense
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: for Lake to join Pushkin's ranks with her new audiobook,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Inside Voice. The book is a deep dive into what
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: our voices mean and what they say about us. Lake
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: explores the psychology and social science of voice. She talks
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: with icons like Drew Barrymore, Jeff gold Bloom, and Pam Greer.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: And when she started questioning herself, she talked to me
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: she was struggling with how to write about the phenomenon
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: of the sexy baby voice. How could she enjoy and
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: respect Paris Hilton. They're Kardashians and various flavors of real housewives,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: all sexy babies, but definitively absolutely not want her own
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: daughter to grow up to be one. It made her
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: feel like a judgmental jerk. So I was the shrink
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: and Lake got on the couch and we had fun
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: working through that one. I may even have tried to
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: put on a little sexy baby voice myself. Enjoy this
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: sample chapter and then go buy yourself a copy at
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: Inside Voice, audiobook dot Com, Audible, Spotify, or anywhere audiobooks
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: are sold. I'll be back before year's end with some
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: bonus episodes of revisionist history.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: When you guys think of like a strong woman's voice,
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: what does that sound like? Someone just like fluent and confident?
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Anyone come to mind? Michelle Obama? Yeah, I think just
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: arian because she's been very advocated for the God is
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: a woman thing.
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: So I'm just like Ariana Grande Queen Latifah.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: I would have to say, Michelle Obama.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: Kirsty Ally, I think has a very deep, powerful voice.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: My mom, Yeah, my mom for sure, Yeah, my mom.
• 2:39
  Speaker 4: Oprah the same here, I would go, I agree with
• 2:43
  Speaker 4: that one.
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: Oprah Dafan the Oprah Okay. Lena Horn, yeah, speaking voice too. Yeah,
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: Lena Horn is my wife. My life is stronger and
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: I really love her and I proud for you. What
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: about an alluring sexy female voice? Jennifer Aniston, Angelina, Jolie.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: Kerrie Washington.
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: Oh that was good, Angelina, Jolie Coobe, Siri.
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: I think Siri? Yeah maybe, Oh you could be different.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: See boys, I don't know. I just think of Catwoman.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: When I think of a sexy woman, I'm like Catwoman.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Kim Kardashian.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: So your turn. When you think of a strong woman,
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: what does she sound like? Does she sound like this?
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: We want people who are redefining what it means to
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: be strong, to be powerful, to be inspirational, to be aspirational, to.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: Be astoundingly aged, defying or does she sound like this?
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: Kylie called Chloe and said, Hey, I want to take
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: over your party. Just send me the list. Three seconds later,
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: Chloe text me, did you tell Kylie about the parties?
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: And I don't know what are you talking about? What party?
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: Make no mistake, both of these women are powerful. Another test,
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: when you think of a sexy woman, what does she
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: sound like? Does she sound like this?
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: Isn't this a coincidence?
• 4:23
  Speaker 5: I know you you're the one that doesn't like to
• 4:25
  Speaker 5: talk about the heat too bad.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: I tell you about my.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: Child, or does she sound like this? I like Barnette's
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: sexy voice and laugh a lot. I kind of like
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: that he gave off a vibe that he was a player.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: One of the more questionable, nay controversial trends to come
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: out of gen Z is the sexy baby voice. What
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: is that you say? Let me remind you my evening's
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: going amazing because I have a ruse.
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: I like was gone for a whole week and still
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: all we can talk about is Crystal.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: All we can think about is Crystal.
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: I like, don't want to make this a.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Night about to honor and kick off this discussion. Here
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: is a never before seen and heard scene from My
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: Future in a World, a film that I wrote, directed
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: and start in entirely about the voiceover industry, because, as
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: we've already established, I'm clearly obsessed. This deleted scene depicts
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: my character Carol, trying to coach a sexy baby into
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: finding her true sound.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Roll it.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: So when he told you here's writing a book where
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: you just like, holy shit, that's amaze balls.
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: Can I do a vocal experiment on you? Why?
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: Why not?
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: Because that's a weird question to ask.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: I don't even know you Carol, you were just interviewing me.
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: Still weird.
• 5:56
  Speaker 5: I'm a vocal coach, I'm a writer.
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: Be good for the story.
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: Fine, fine, okay, good. So you're just gonna count a ten,
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: but when you get to the odd numbers, you're gonna
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: use the lowest point in your register, and when you
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: get to the even numbers, you're gonna use the highest
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: point in your register. And then right after you're just
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: gonna speak without thinking. So you're gonna go one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, hey,
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: nine ten.
• 6:25
  Speaker 5: Here's my voice.
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: One two, three, four, five, six seven nine ten.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: Here's my voice. Oh my god. Right, that's so weird.
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: It sounds lower, and it sounds.
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: A mass pulse.
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: Let's make something crystal clear before we delve into the
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: sexy baby zone, which is also a no judgment zone.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: This is a safe place to regard and appreciate a
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: unique cultural phenomenon. In fact, I have long been inspired
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: and in awe of this vocal trend and seek to
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: focus on it through a cultural lens. What factors brought
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: it into the American English language in the first place,
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: and how did it evolve over time for any one person.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: In my formative years, it was Paris Hilton. I thought
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: she was extraordinary, hilarious, awesome, larger than life, and there
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: was something really special there. Sure, much of the allure
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: was the outfits and the status, but there was something
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: unique about Paris that nobody else could quite emulate. Nobody
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: could get to that level of her stardom. Why the voice?
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: She captured the world with a voice that broadcasted both
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: little girl submission and overt sexuality concurrently unfathomable feat or
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: was it?
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: I just have like a drive inside of me, like
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: I love creating, I love doing what I do.
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: I love making people happy, and I love making money.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Paris, thanks so much for being here. I appreciate I
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: know that he waves been crazy. It was like ninety
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: seven degrees.
• 8:28
  Speaker 4: Of a day.
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  Speaker 2: That's hot.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: Did you see that.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: Ross and Rachel might be dating a real life that's hot?
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: How would you pronounce Vin Hart's last name in a
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: British accent?
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: That's hot? It is hot? And yet I want to
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: admit that I struggle. Okay, there's a struggle here. If
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: my personal cultural north star is creating space for a
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: female vocal sound to imbue trustworthiness, all knowing electable authority,
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: then how does the rampant trend of the sexy baby
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: voice impact that effort? I mean, I can admit that
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: I enjoy the wildly moorish entertainment provided by the Audis
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: Paris Hilton, the storm that is, the Kardashians and every
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: Real housewives of whatever the fuck they're all flooded with
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: sexy babies. But here's the kicker. Do I want my
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: daughter to grow up and speak like that? The answer
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: is hell no. And see now I feel bad. Now,
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: I feel like some judgmental jerk. I'm genuinely in an
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: existential crisis on this issue. So I opted to phone
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: a friend. But not just any friend. I needed a
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: deep thinker who also happened to be a best selling author,
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: a public speaker type that the whole world has stamped
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: an authority on unpacking big and controversial ideas. So I
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: turned to the iconic public speaker, best selling author of
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: multiple zeitgeist making books like The Tipping Point and Outliers,
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: among others, and of course, founder of Pushkin Industries. That's right,
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: Malcolm Gladwell. Malcolm has been hearing about my deep seated
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: sexy baby struggle four years at this point, and Frankly,
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: he's the only person who can flip the script and
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: interrogate me on this very issue that I myself have
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: brought to the proverbial table.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: Wait wait, okay, hold up, there'd be much more specific
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: and break it down. First of all, we have these
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: elements that you've identified. Are they all equally important or
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: are they they they all play You can't rank them.
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  Speaker 1: You can't say, sexy baby is sixty percent, this, twenty percent?
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: This, No, it's a cocktail.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: It's a cocktail. Okay, number one, the vocal fright.
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: I would say number one, pitch.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: Pitch.
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: Okay, I would go straight to pitch, because first you've
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: gotta this is very hard for me to do, is
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: to kind of dial in because I enjoy kind of
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: putting all cocktail together because it's like once you have
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: a martini, it's like you always want the mix. So
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: if I can just get the pitch, it's so we're here,
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: and I'm already starting to fry a little bit, but
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: I'm trying not to so that I can just take pitch.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: This is pitch. So this is like if I were
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: to be talking to you in an intellectual way, but
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: I'm just pitched up.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: Okay, yes, now then you layer on that. Now, by
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: the way, do you ever we're not talking about Sexy Baby,
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: We're talking about Lake Bell. Hi. Do you ever operate
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: in that pitch?
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: Never?
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: Never?
• 11:47
  Speaker 5: Okay, yeah, even a a in a sexual encounter, if
• 11:52
  Speaker 5: I may, I do not find myself pitching up to
• 11:55
  Speaker 5: that level or because that's the only time I could think.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: Sorry, very revealing.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: When you spoke to your children when they were babies,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: did you go off that h No, oh you did.
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: No. I would never go this high for anything. But
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: first of all, it's you know, it's athletic. That's one
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: of the things about Sexy Baby is that it's like
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: hard to do, like you have to work hard at it.
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: It is an athletic.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: Feat layer in the next thing.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: The next thing would be fry. And I'm guilty of
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: a little fry here and there. I think we all are.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: We have a sprinkle of fry. You know, it's like
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: a cultural trend. It's like skinny jeans. You know, it's in,
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: and then we all kind of adopt it and we
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: don't even notice. So notice, no, you know, I got
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: a little there. So when you have this and then
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: you start adding in the fry, So.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: Teach me how to do fry. Assume I've never heard
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: of it.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: Again, I'm not a professional, but I will say the
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: fry is a croak. It's in the back of your throat,
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: so you're gonna roll it kind of like you're a frog.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: So closer. So so give me like a like why,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: like why close?
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: I'm getting there.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: The thing is, you have some you have some, take
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: some water, you have some. You're swallowing it, so you're going, ah,
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: you're getting stuck in a tightness in your throat versus
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: like forward opening it up.
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: Just a.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: Getting in. I don't know how to form a word
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: with that.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: Too, like why why?
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: Why? Why? Wait? Do that? Do?
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: Like why? Ah?
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: You see?
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: So like why no you don't the fry in the uptalk?
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: Is there a place in the sentence where those two
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: things operate. So we're always in the upper register, So
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: pitch is a constant, but we're not frying everything.
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: Uh, fry is like seasoning. You can't fry all the
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: way through or else you would just have a croak sound.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: So fry is really kind of like there's a dance there. So,
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: for instance, in my normal speech, I would say, for instance,
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: and that's a plateau. We're just like on a road
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: going forward. For instance, is obviously a classic up talk
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: with a little sprinkle of fry and pitch up.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: What work is fry doing? Is it comic? Is it
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: for emphasis?
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: I think it comes from a place of like sex.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: This is part of the sexy flavor of spice, because
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: I think when I've interviewed people, Hey, you know what's
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: the most alluring sexy voice in a woman? It tends
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: to be croakier voices. It tends to be smokier voices.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: And whether they're high voices or low voices, they all
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: seem to have that element in them.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: And it's paradoxical because it's a smoky kind of guttural
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: thing that's taking place at a very high Yeah.
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm trying to think of like men who fry,
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: because there's a ton of men who fry as well.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: You know who fries? Who fries? Henry Kissinger, he fries. Yeah,
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: but it's a it's a kind of German.
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: Fry, a Truman fry.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: No, it's a kind of like but it is the
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: friendship upset.
• 15:28
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I will mistake anything on the proposition that before
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: the end of this year, Goebachev will be in Washington,
• 15:37
  Speaker 4: and I'll take only a little lesson the proposition that
• 15:40
  Speaker 4: before the end of next year President Reagan will be
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: in Moscow.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: But wait, you did something else and Sexy Baby that
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: you haven't talked about, which is you were also running
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: some words together.
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: So that's the that is quality. So yeah, that's a
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: little I will say that kind of creeps into performance
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: a little bit to help me get in there, you know,
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: just as an actor and as a performer, for instance,
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: with accents, I have either a hand jester or you know,
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: a catchphrase to get you into an accent, like Irish
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: is pulled Bach on the bull on the bout. I
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: don't know if I'll ever need to put anything in
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: a bucket, but in an Irish accent probably you know
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: what I mean. So like that's like my in there.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: In my experience with hearing Sexy Baby in the wild, Yes,
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: in there, sentences without spaces. Imagine typing a set. Yeah,
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: there's no punctuation, there's no punctuation whatsoever. It's that that
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: irritates me.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: And like what really bothers me about climate change or whatever?
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: Is that like we're now working together, and like if
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: we could just like work together, like you didn't meet,
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: so much more of our power together and like that
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: for me is just like swim we're it, meaning we're it.
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: If I was like an oil company and I wanted
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: to really get people to be skeptical of climate change,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: I would just run of what you just said.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: That's here's the yell. Drying a car like gas or
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: whatever is like just like American.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: But there's so there's there's that running together, and then
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: there's also a little bit of slurring that you're adding.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: There's no you're right, there's like a little bit of sorry,
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: I think that I just want to say something that's
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: really important. It's just like it doesn't mean you're not smart.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: The accent and the dialect. Why I have a bone
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: to pick with it is because like I am a
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: feminist and like I don't want to think of women
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: as little sexy babies that can't think for themselves, and
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: so it's really hard for me. I really think of
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: it as a trend that's gotten out of control. You know,
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: it was kind of cute for a beat. It was
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: in a movie or two, you know, and there was
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: a kind of a texture of sound that was born
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: from the California a surfer girl community, valley esque environment.
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: But I do think that that compounded with the history
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: like before that, where did it come from? It's like, okay,
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: there's Betty Boop, And I think that Betty Boop is
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: a good place to start just as a reference, because
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: it's very distinct. She is sexualized, she's not homely, the
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: ideas that she's alluring.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: But there's no fry in Betty Boop.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: Boo, No, there's not. There's not. Betty Boop is kind
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: of the original sexy baby though, just as a concept.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: That's the where the archetype comes from.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, boo do do boop boop be doop.
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: But there's been a great deal of linguistic innovation, yes,
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: between then, and how does Marilyn Monroe fit into this evolution?
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: That's breathiness, is it?
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah? But she also is broadcasting a bedroom voice, so
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: why I just don't know, and a little baby voice
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: but you know, oh well listen, peaky. You know that's
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: very high pitched. So you've got the grounds there for
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: that starting place, which is we didn't really get the
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: breathiness in the sexy baby voice. But we got that pitch,
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: you know, and that alluring sexy nature of bedroom talk
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: that's like outward and being exposed to everyone. I mean,
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: that was her whole thing. So that's why I have
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: the word sexy in it.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: It's super interesting because if we think of Paris Hilton
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: and Kim Kardashian as people who are taking the intimacy
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: of the sex tape and kind of taking it public,
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: Marilyn Monroe's famous Happy Birthday sung to JFK when she
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: was presumably in the middle of having an affair with
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: is the same thing, right. I mean, she's essentially saying,
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: I'm having an affair with this guy. Right, That's the
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: whole point of the happy Birthday thing, is this is
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: the way we are when we're in bed together, and
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: I'm doing it in front of the entire country. It's
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: like such an incredible like it's like this, fuck you
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: first of all to Jackie. I mean, it's just but
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: it's an extraordinary it is an extraordinary cultural moment.
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: Day to you.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: Happy birthday.
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: So Paris Hilm comes along in the aughts, right, talking
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: like this, and it becomes a kind of sensation and
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: it proves quite culturally contagious, and I'm wondering why why
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: would the sexy baby voice come back at that moment.
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: It boils down to sex tapes, kind of like the
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: women that we're talking about. If we're going to bring
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: up Paris and Kim, they both had that right. They
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: had a sex tape that was leaked. And by the way,
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: speaking of another classic voice and a sex tape, pamel Anderson.
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: Now that voice, you know, is effective, and so I
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: feel like there's something there where it's like taking the
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: bedroom voice and broadcasting it and allowing for that intimacy
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: to be a part of the brand. Rhymestones. There's no
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: such thing as too many rhinestones, because it's hot to
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: bling as much as possible.
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: You have complicated feelings about sexy Baby, which I want
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: to kind of dig into a little bit. You've alluded
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: to them here and there, but you have a sexy
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: baby problem.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: I have unwelcome judgment in my views on it because
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: even in Penning in a World, it was part of
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: the you know, sort of joke of it was, what
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: is this trend, this plague that is infecting our women?
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: And it felt like regression. It felt not like progress
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: just on a feminist bent. It is a sound that
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: parkens Our ears back to a time when you are
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: a child, when you have to ask for things, you
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: don't have agency, And so why is that sound? A
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: submissive little girl sound somehow sexy. All of a sudden,
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: I had a bone to pick with that. You started
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: to see women who were in their forties have great jobs,
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: their lawyers, their CEO or whatever, and they started to
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: have this sound. And that's where I got confused and
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: upset because I thought, Okay, so you're saying, especially as
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: a mother, society is allowing for or supporting this idea
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: that women can sound like little girls and be leaders.
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: And that for me was difficult because I don't want
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: my daughter to think that that's how you're supposed to sound.
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: I don't want my son to think that women should
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: sound that way. And I feel bad for feeling uncomfortable
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: because I think that women should sound. However, the dam this.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: Is why I don't understand. I don't understand why you
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: feel bad about being uncomfortable.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: Because I'm a woman. We feel badly for judging other women.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: But hold on the argument that you're making in your book,
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: is that a lot of the way we sound is
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: a choice. So women, a certain group of women have
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: chosen either consciously or unconsciously, to sound this way. They
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: don't have to sound this way, right, They have options. Yes,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: our voice is our own. We control the way we sound.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: And you're simply saying that's a bad choice or a
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: problematic choice.
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: You are saying that I should feel comfortable with feeling uncomfortable.
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: Yes, well, I'm wondering why you're so conflicted about the
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: fact that you find this voice to be an issue.
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: Okay, So because, for instance, I have a pal let's
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: call her RS, and she has a very high pitched voice,
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: naturally off the truck. Okay, So she's not putting it on.
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: She just has that voice. I love her. She's so sweet.
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: She's got a little fry then a little uptalk. But
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: she's a mom of three, she works hard, and I
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: just know her. And so it's people like that where
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: I go. I know she's not putting it on. I
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: also understand that she's probably not a vocally obsessed person
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: and isn't thinking about it so much. And so when
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: you say it's a choice, I concur that it is
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: a choice. Once you listen to it, and once you're
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: aware of it and you're in the room with it.
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: But I think that it's important in my research on
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: this to allow for there to be space for that's
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: just how they speak, but when it's something that's like
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: plaguing someone and they're kind of using it as a tool,
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: especially when it comes to a woman of a certain
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: age who's imbuing this sound that's of a young woman.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: You know, I think in our voices, let's own it.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: Let's own it that it's sexy to sound your age,
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: or it's sexy to sound like a mature woman.
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: I know that's not their natural sound, especially after giving
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: birth twice. Your voice changes after birth, you know it should.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: It's a it's an experience, but also chemically, hormonally, your
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: voice changes, and that's a privilege. Aging is a privilege.
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: So own it.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: That was an excerpt from Lake Bell's Inner Voice, which
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: is a delight. Go get your copy today at Inside Voice,
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: audiobook dot Com, Audible, Spotify, and everywhere audiobooks are sold.