It’s all too easy to reference the inner fear currently pervading President Joe Biden’s newly inherited America. Luckily, for those of us who choose to back him, our 46th president is no stranger to the sensation of dread. As I write this, I’m continuing to paint my own reimagining of a distant memory relayed by Biden, in an interview with The Atlantic’s John Hendrickson.
Per Biden’s recounting, I’d like you to picture a kid cooped up in a dull-walled grade-school classroom. A pre-teen Joseph Biden clumped into horizontal rows of bored classmates, brimming anxiously as he awaits his turn to read from a dingy textbook. Stress growing as other students mow through page by page.
“I could count down how many paragraphs, and I’d memorize it, because I found it easier to memorize than look at the page and read the word. I’d pretend to be reading,” Biden slowly told Hendrickson.
Undoubtedly, this is an example of dread. Dread on a smaller, Covid-19-less stage. But it is dread, and It speaks to an instance that I, too, experienced years ago.
For me, it was The Outsiders, a staple of literature that to this day I can just adequately enough recall. What I do remember is the tightness that would creep into my shoulders. Stopping as it reached the tip of my jaw. Similar to Biden, I would also force myself to calculate which section of Ponyboy’s musings would fall to me. The mere thought of having to orate in class was enough to add tension uncommon for most gangly 12-year-olds. My headspace rejected the notion of “staying golden” as I awaited the embarrassment I knew was coming my way.
Like President Biden, I stutter.
Or maybe it’s more impactful to say, like me, Joe Biden (man first, then president) stutters.
Hiding in Plain Sight? Heavily Criticized? All of the Above?
Maybe you’ve picked up on Joe Biden’s stutter, but I’d guess that some of you haven’t, up to this point. As we’ve grown more accustomed to a podium hovering Biden, those familiar with stuttering have pinpointed a few trademarks of our repertoire when tuning in to his speeches. Several (slow pace, the breathy intervals in his voice, the fleeting eye movements) have blended synonymously into the formation of Joe’s public character.
I will admit that his slipups rarely even replicate severe stutters. Most of the time appearing subtle, and more like natural relapses.
So, what are you even saying, Pat? That our national leader doesn’t stutter? Are you implying that the old crank needs to be barred up in a Floridian retirement community? That the only thing Joe Biden truly possesses is a hankering for Vanilla ice-cream cones and mid-day naps? !
Well, no. I’m not a Fox News anchor, nor do I enjoy roleplaying as one. I’m actually going to tell you what they adamantly refuse to acknowledge. President Biden, although a few mindsets away from being a millennial, is just as cognizant as you and me on a good day. He exemplifies a little known fact regarding stutterers, that an individual can both speak fluently and struggle with stuttering.
Yes, at the exact same time.
Some “Biden-isms”, if that’s what you wish to call them, are merely ways of maintaining a gentle string of speech. Those minuscule pauses commonly heard in the President’s words are a concrete trait found in many stutterers’ lifestyles. Physical tools employed as frequently as incessant interjections may spew from the mouth of a fluent speaker. (Please see the 2020 Presidential Debate if you would like an example of this.)
What many mislabel as forgetfulness is a side of Biden that I am confidently able to identify with. The always calculative energy spreading throughout the mind as it clambers to remain one step ahead of the mouth. Deciphering what words seem like they’re going to come cleanly. Having alternative phrasings readily on cue in case they don’t.
All of this plays a part in making us stutterers appear like we’re orbiting in and out of a confused state. But really, we’re kind of doing a robot’s work. Slyly continuing to reprogram new thoughts that will translate in ways that make the most sense. ( I’m definitely not condoning a robotic Presidential candidate, but I’m also not going to say it’s any worse than a reality television host. Let’s leave it at that.)
Either way, the “Sleepy Joe” narrative remains as ignorantly ableist as ever. Right-wing media sources who prey upon Biden’s every hiccup do nothing but expose themselves as willfully uneducated when it comes to speech-defects. It speaks to their lack of empathy as clearly as it does their intelligence levels. And goes to show that there’s no amount of time spent playing putt-putt at Mar a Lago that would ever equate to understanding the complexities of stuttering.
Ironically, the fact that Biden manages to stutter on a lesser, sometimes undetectable level, opens the door wide enough for such shameful rhetoric to continue. For every thoughtful appeal on behalf of the President’s stutter, there will be three explicit allusions that imply dementia. Or blatant declarations of plain ole stupidity, also ironic when you account for the source.
I’m hoping for (but never fully expecting) a change in the critique of Biden’s cognitive abilities. Not only is his brain free from deterioration, but you may even say it works harder than the median expectation.
(And it has to.)
A Willingness to Work. A Willingness to Speak.
With a sense of urgency similar to the one he’s using to try (isn’t it nice… that he’s willing to?) and clean up a nation in disarray, Joe spent a lot of his youth pushing himself to overcome his difficulties communicating.
When it came to his paper route, he strategized by preparing responses to anticipated encounters with neighbors. Biden explained to Hendrickson “I knew the one guy loved the Phillies. And he’d asked me about them all the time. And I knew another person would ask me about my sister, so I would practice an answer.”
Hell, I’ve done the same thing when dining out. Softly repeating phrases under my breath like “Bacon Cheeseburger, please” until it feels partway solidified in my brain. Ultimately it’s the “I’ll have a D-D-Diet Coke” that usually ambushes me, but we can’t win them all.
Joe and I practiced similar methods in our fight for fluency. We both took part in speech therapy, (Biden only in kindergarten, while I attended desperately for several years) and what I’m starting to think I should just call “self-bedroom-imprisonment”. Biden has talked about how he “waged a personal war on stuttering from the confines of his bedroom…”, reciting the words of great speakers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson. All to a still audience consisting of his bedroom mirror. And reflection, of course, which he would mask with a flashlight in order to deter from unconventional facial movements. Still, to this day he remembers Emerson’s “The American Scholar” in full. As demonstrated when he performed it flawlessly during his meeting with Hendrickson.
Biden attests to practicing his speaking with attention to its rhythmic nature, which is a normal technique used for managing stutters.
Thinking in full phrases, instead of word by word, cushions the syntax of a stutterer. I’m not entirely sure of the schematics leading to success, but I do know that it usually helps me. Especially when acting, I always try to think of each line as a “mini journey” from beginning to end. With attention to how each sound transitions to the next.
A timeless tactic taught way before my time. But also Biden’s, too.
The Kings Speech, an Academy Award Winning flick focusing on one of history’s most famous stutterers, King George V1, has had a seemingly profound effect on Biden. He quickly picked up on shared methods between him and the King, fascinating him a great deal.
The President has since gone on record saying that he marks up his addresses similar to how King George would to his.
“So what I do, if I say, ‘The Democratic presidential town hall is tonight on CNN,’ I’ll say: ‘The presidential town hall, slash, is on CNN tonight, slash, it’s going to have the following people, slash, Anderson Cooper is going to speak, slash…”, Biden retorted during a February 2020 Town Hall Meeting.
In theatre, marking one’s script helps indicate key changes in tactic, blocking, and the shifting of emotional beats. Biden, however, uses the system foremost as a visual cue reminding him to breathe.
To go slow and to breathe.
What More Can Be Said?
When I first conceptualized this piece, I knew, at least subconsciously, that I would need to break it up into a two-part examination. It’s not every-day a stutterer gets to sit down in the Oval Office, you know what I mean? There’s a lot asking to be unpacked here.
I’m looking at Joe Biden from a perspective a lot of Americans would deem too specific to connect with.
Personally, there is so much more that I feel needs to be said about President Biden and how he uses his voice. But it was important to me that we begin with a more fact-heavy look. I found myself getting oddly emotional, almost manic at times while writing, and there were multiple occasions where I had to shorten the length of my thoughts.
That’s how I know there is more to be said.
A more opinionated Part 2 may contain a more flawed portrayal of Biden. But for now I’ll leave you with this:
Being able to watch a president who struggles as I do is something I’m going to try and cherish, to a degree. Even so, I can’t help but feel that, as a lifelong stutterer, I owe it to myself to remain critical of number 46.
46 the man..
and the president…
and 46 the stutterer, too…
Works Cited
Hendrickson, John. “What Joe Biden Can’t Bring Himself to Say.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, Jan. 2020, www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/01/joe-biden-stutter-profile/602401/.
Sullivan, Kate, and Eric Bradner. “Biden Opens up about Stuttering and Offers Advice to Young People Who Stutter.” CNN, Cable News Network, 6 Feb. 2020, www.cnn.com/2020/02/05/politics/joe-biden-stutter/index.html.