Some Have Said 0
In English, the passive voice has several legitimate uses:
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1. When the speaker wants to emphasize the recipient of an action over the doer of the action (“The house was destroyed” rather than “the fire destroyed the house,” when the house is the topic).
2. When the doer of the action is unknown (“The till was emptied”).
3. When not pointing out the doer of the action makes for tact (“This blog post sucked eggs–wait! that’s active could have been writtten better.”).
And one illegitimate (sadly, the most common) use:
- When the speaker wants to avoid acknowledging responsibility for his or her actions (“Mistakes were made“).
