OPINION: When I’m hearing the voice of God, why does she sound like a man?
I’m a 21-year-old woman and I have a man’s voice in my head. I noticed it only recently. I was a writing a news-style article for a school assignment when I became aware that the voice in my head, with which I was composing, was that of a male news writer. I pictured him in a black and white photo, behind a desk piled with a papers and a crammed ashtray. As I thought about it, I realized that I frequently write with this man’s voice in mind.
I don’t know when it started or why it happens, but it seems to occur when I’m writing something official-sounding, like professional emails or certain school assignments.
This is weird, because my mother was a feminist and taught my sister and me the importance of never considering ourselves inferior to men. I don’t believe that men are smarter than women, that they should have more influence than we do, that they’re better writers or are more authoritative. I’m not deliberately trying to capture a man’s voice or speech patterns to achieve a desired effect in my writing. In fact, a woman’s perspective is central to much of it. The male voice that I’m thinking in is just there.