Lip reading is hardly an exact science. jeremy freeman49, who has been called upon as an expert lip reader in cases involving sexual assault, insurance fraud and other serious matters, describes it as a skill that can be honed with a lot of practice. As for Mr. Freeman, who was born deaf, he said, “The practice has been ingrained in me ever since I grew up.”
He added that he still relies on other cues, such as body language and social context, to determine what is being said. “There is guesswork involved,” said Mr Freeman, who works as a writer near London. “I would never say I can read lips 100 percent accurately.” Some, such as Scottish comedian and actor Billy Connolly, find him confusing. “I think it’s impossible to read lips,” Mr. Freeman said.
Besides accuracy there is a question of ethics. Is lip reading an invasion of privacy?
Mr. Freeman said that he would never lip read anyone in his house. But if it’s a celebrity at a live event, like Coronation of King Charles III, which he read for a media outlet, he considers it “a piece of commentary”. (He said he later heard from a deaf person who thought it was an invasion of privacy.)
Ms. Dellinger said they too have their limits. In a video she posted on Beach Conversations Olivia Rodrigo and Iris Apatow In the front row of a Los Angeles Lakers game, Ms. Dellinger dropped the name of a man Ms. Rodrigo said she was dating.
Kristin Calvoy, 25, another popular lip reader on TikTok, said she would not annotate videos in which she felt something too personal was being said. He recent lip read footage During the coronation, members of the royal family chose not to try to explain what Affleck was saying at the Grammys, which some TikTok users asked him to do.
“The last thing I would want is for private moments to leak,” said Ms. Kalvoy, who is deaf. ‘We want to know what’s going on? Is Ben drinking again?’ You don’t want to be fuel to that fire.
