Unimpressive voices can still win most courtroom cases
Evidence
But he had won most of his cases, more than sixty in all, in spite of his voice. He knew that some trial lawyers claimed a strong opening statement like Schlichtmann’s could win a case outright. — , Harr Jonathan - A Civil Action, 1714
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to the recurring theme of substantive advantage beating performative polish — cf. Deli’s criminalization of immodest speech in Annihilation of Caste, where form mattered less than entrenched power. — connects to: A huge variety of speech sounds can be made without vocal folds; Listeners may be judging speech intelligibility rather than raw signal-to-noise ratio — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 5673; Effective legal communication requires balancing clarity against condescension — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law: A Definitive Look at…, 688 (+2 more)
Broader Connections
- Natural-sounding speech can still be poorly intelligible
#complicates(1.00) - A huge variety of speech sounds can be made without vocal folds
#complicates(0.90) - Listeners may be judging speech intelligibility rather than raw signal-to-noise ratio
#complicates(0.90) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 5673 - Effective legal communication requires balancing clarity against condescension
#expands(0.85) — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 688 - Humans can isolate a single speaker amid competing voices and noise
#complicates(0.80) — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 1329