Jessie's kept stammering in the public eye. Who'll come next?

Image

Caption

Leys and (inset) Jessie from The Traitors (Courtesy of BBC/Studio Lambert/Euan Cherry)

Prompted by the current exposure of stammering thanks to Jessie on The Traitors, Leys Geddes recalls his own awareness-raising media appearances when he chaired our charity.

When I was young, I was impressed by Patrick Campbell, who appeared on TV quite frequently. You can still find videos of him on YouTube, for instance his appearance on the Dick Cavett Show.   

Like me, Patrick had a stammer and, like mine, it was the kind where your speech seems to be going along quite nicely, but suddenly you get stuck and your face contorts mid-block. People sometimes shrink back in surprise: "Jeez, what's wrong with him?"

• Become a STAMMA for free and join our community

Patrick was very open about his stammer and, despite the common perception that stammering is a sign of severe nervousness, a weak personality or even limited intelligence, it was clear that he was neither nervous, weak nor stupid. He set a perfect example — as did Jessie, on The Traitors. He and she both stammer markedly, but that hasn't stopped them speaking in public. And, because they speak confidently, and they smile, their warm personalities come shining through — which is another helpful way of melting the prejudice we often face.

Someone needed to speak out

When I first joined the British Stammering Association (now STAMMA), the aim was to create a world which understands stammering. I thought this was the perfect objective. Although I was impressed with the videos some stammerers were posting of themselves speaking online, these were only screened in closed, stammering groups. They were often bravely done, but they were not helping the outside world to understand stammering. We stammerers were talking to ourselves. And if the broadcast media wanted to do something on stammering, they tended to feature therapists or people who claimed to have been 'cured'. So we were letting fluent people speak for us and our mysterious condition was hardly ever seen or heard.

...their warm personalities come shining through — which is another helpful way of melting the prejudice we often face.

By the time I became a BSA Trustee, I had concluded that someone needed to speak out — to the world — about stammering. It was important that the person chosen had an obvious stammer, so people could see the condition with which we were dealing, and that he or she did not appear to be nervous, weak nor stupid. Unlike Patrick or Jessie, I was not any kind of media star, and my serious purpose was not just to be seen stammering, but to really educate people about it. Nevertheless, I eventually self-selected myself (ha-hah) and opened a YouTube channel called speakingout2, as Speaking Out was the name of the BSA's members' magazine. 

My first video, 'Stammering is no joke' (watch it below), went down well, as we had got support from an MP, Kate Hoey, and the Health Editor of the Guardian. The story was picked up by the BBC and more than 30 other media outlets in the UK and abroad. At the peak of the campaign, hits on the BSA website rose from around 1,500 a day to 3,700. Radio interviews followed.

Media appearances

The BBC Radio 4 interview I did with Eddie Mair was a discussion about whether stammering could be comedy. Stammering was clearly not thought to make good radio so, as the Beeb was uncertain how things might go, they decided to record the interview rather than do it live. At the end, Eddie asked if I would like them to 'tidy up' my speech in the editing suite. To which I replied, "No, thank you. There is no point in me coming on here to talk about stammering if you are going to cut it out". So they left it in. To my surprise, the report and audience comments on the interview are still online, 18 years later. As this was something new for most people, they make interesting reading. 

I replied, "No, thank you. There is no point in me coming on here to talk about stammering if you are going to cut it out".

As Chair of the BSA, I appeared on radio and TV quite often. Sometimes, I could feel the anxiety in programme producers and compères when I was due to appear. Would there be lengthy silences? Would it be embarrassing? Would the interview overrun the allotted time? Would people turn off? I don't think any of these things happened, and I was heartened by the fact that I was being contacted by media people who wanted someone to talk about stammering.

Many of my media appearances were related to The King's Speech, which had just been released. For once, there was a sudden demand for a real, live stammerer to come on — which I was very happy to do. I used to say that I was delighted to have been asked to appear, but I bet that, unfortunately, the interest in stammering would be short-lived. And so it proved.

I clearly remember waiting on set for my turn to sit on BBC Breakfast's red sofa. 'What the hell am I doing here?', I thought. But then I reminded myself that, if I was going to talk to millions of people about stammering, it didn't matter if I stammered, because they needed educating.

We need to keep it up

Each of us is different, and our stammers are different. For me, dealing with that deep-seated fear of public speaking has been the most helpful therapy of my life — even though I still stammer, and still worry a little about public speaking. And I hope that what I did, back then, helped the world to understand stammering a little better. 

But we need to keep it up. Disability has mostly come to mean people in wheelchairs, for whom wonderful changes have been made in terms of equality, accessibility, understanding and empathy. But stammering has remained almost inaudible, invisible and ignored, even though a difficulty in speaking, and often a complete reluctance to do anything which might require public speaking, is a very real disability.

Has Jessie's appearance on The Traitors help change that? She's kept stammering in the public eye today, but who will come next?

My thanks go to Jon Smith, STAMMA Patron, and Nicky Campbell of BBC 5 live, two people who have helped me on my journey.

Read more Your Voice articles. 

Would you like to write an article? See Submit Something For The Site or email editor@stamma.org for details.