 Although the ethic of care is still in a fairly developmental stage, defended more fully in a 2006 book by Virginia Held, it has been criticized by some feminists as being merely a feminine, but not a feminist, moral theory. A feminine ethic gives weight to the experiences and intuitions of women, but it need not aim at ending women’s oppression; a feminist ethic has as one of its aims ending women’s oppression. If care is a motive that women experience mainly in connection with their being in a position of exploitation, then one worry is that valorizing it in moral theory does not overcome, but may even perpetuate, its role in women’s oppression. Sarah Hoagland, for instance, criticizes the ethic of care for at least three reasons: that it is grounded in the unequal relationship of a mother having natural care for her child which may not, especially in a male child, ever be reciprocated; that it fails to acknowledge the real conflict that some mothers feel between resentment and tenderness; and that in appealing to the feminine which is itself a product of the masculine world, it risks perpetuating women’s oppression (Hoagland 1991, 253, 254, and 256). Marilyn Friedman critiques the kind of care involved in the ethic of care. While men’s caring, as revealed in earning a paycheck and providing material goods for the family, has to do with protection and material forms of help that men control, women’s caring, as revealed in emotional work, has to do with admitting dependency and sharing or losing control, which contributes to their own oppression (Friedman 1993, 175 and 177). Lawrence Blum, et.al., argue that women’s caring reinforces the suppression of the self and leads to a denial of their autonomy, and makes mothers judge their success solely in terms of the success of their children, making them lose touch with their own needs (Blum, et.al. 1973–74, 231–32, 235, and 239). Claudia Card argues that sometimes the caring that women engage in is not virtuous, but instead is misplaced gratitude to men who either have the power to abuse them or offer women the privilege of service in exchange for “protection” (Card 1993, 216). Women’s caring is often a survival strategy, and so Gilligan is wrong to think that women’s reasoning can deepen and correct the ethics of the more privileged (207). Card believes that too often women do not discriminate good from bad relationships, and end up assuming responsibility for maintaining any relationships they come to be involved in by trying to satisfy everyone because they are afraid to say “no.” Barbara Houston cautions that if care, like anything else in ethics, is declared good or right or just, it had better be so for women (Houston 1987, 261). While Houston agrees with the feminist intention to reclaim womanly virtues as virtues in the face of their absence from contemporary moral theory, she cautions that these virtues, including care, should win the liberation of women, make women’s subordination a primary moral concern, make it a recognizable moral problem rather than a nonmoral matter, challenge the status quo of women’s social position, and not further women’s oppression (255).