Many French feminists hold that the rational and unemotive language of traditional philosophical discourse should be challenged by women, since it has been used for so long to defend systems that oppress women. The French feminist philosopher Catherine Clement, however, disagrees with feminists who refuse to use organized discursive language and who heckle female public speakers who do use such language: “To speak publicly in a theoretical fashion is, according to the hecklers, to assume the position of ‘the man.’ If these feminists are right, then rational argumentation and dialectics become inaccessible to women; their only permitted response to injustice would be an obtuse one, unthinking in its expression. Although rhetoric and philosophical discursiveness have been formed by centuries of male cultural domination, to renounce the exercise of thought, to dismiss it as male, is to perpetuate the status quo. Simply telling women to ‘Be feminists and shout your anger’ is merely…[a] variant of telling them to ‘Be beautiful and hold your tongue.’

Consider each of the choices separately and select all that apply.

Which of the following statements provides the best paraphrase for the final sentence of the passage?

A.Those feminists who try to recruit women to their cause by prescribing dramatic public actions have misread the attitudes of most women.

B.Women who have never studied the specialized discourse of philosophical disputation are unsuited to judge its potential utility to the feminist cause.

C.To demand that women renounce the language of rational argumentation is in reality to demand that they say nothing.

D.Prescribing the manner in which women should express themselves in public will guarantee their right to self-expression.

E.Encouraging women to adopt a more assertive tone in public will change presumptions some people have about women’s proper role.