Carol Gilligan's discussion of the differences in the development of moral conception between males and females in the book "In a different voice" brought into fore how society influences the way in which females are continually constrained into formulating moral decisions by themselves only. Explicating further on this point, Gilligan used the issue of abortion as an example wherein questions of a woman's morality is questioned by the society, thereby constraining them to make decisions on whether or not to subsist to abortion based on their own decision alone. What prevails in society, the article argues, is that women should base their moral decisions not only from their own judgment and reflection, but they must also take into consideration the viewpoint of their society as well (regarding the issue). What occurs is the emergence of a double standard, wherein females face the challenge of reconciling "compassion and autonomy" and "virtue and power." The self and the other, as what Gilligan referred to the two individualities that develop within a woman in the process of moral conception, is now in conflict, and the female individual cannot just take for granted one self over the other: both are essential in her development as an individual. Subsistence to one "self" results to marginalization. If she chooses to decide for herself alone, she is empowered yet considered morally wrong by her society; if she decides based on what society tells her, she gave up her power to decide as an individual. Indeed, this dilemma addressed by Gilligan is expressed effectively in the essay, wherein she argued, "[t]he moral imperative that emerges repeatedly in ... women is an injunction to care ... For men, the moral imperative appears rather ... To protect from interference the rights to life and self-fulfillment. Women's insistence on care is at first self-critical rather than self-protective ... " Thus, females' moral conception is more difficult and conflicting in nature than males', a reality that needs to be addressed in the society in order to emancipate women from the bonds that continually repress them from fully realizing their fulfillment as individuals.
