Passive voice is used when the focus is on the action rather than the subject performing the action. In passive sentences, the thing receiving the action becomes the subject. The thing doing the action can be optionally included at the end of the sentence. Passive voice is useful when the actor is unknown, unimportant, or when using passive voice makes a statement more polite by omitting blame. Passive voice follows a formula of [subject] + [be] + [past participle] + [optional by phrase]. Active voice sentences can be changed to passive voice by making the object of the active sentence the subject of the passive sentence.