Social Impact
The historically laborious process of washing clothes (a task which often had a whole day set aside to perform) has at times been labelled "woman's work".
In 2009 L'Osservatore Romano published an article entitled "The Washing Machine and the Liberation of Women" that was controversially meant to demonstrate that the washing machine had done more for the liberation of women than the contraceptive pill and abortion rights, which are often associated with Women's Day. The article shocked Italian feminists and provoked criticism from Opposition MP Paola Concia. A study from Université de Montréal, Canada presented a similar point of view.
Swedish statistician Hans Rosling suggested that the positive effect the washing machine had on the liberation of women, makes it "the greatest invention of the industrial revolution".
Read more about this topic: Washing Machine
Famous quotes containing the words social and/or impact:
“An educational method that shall have liberty as its basis must intervene to help the child to a conquest of liberty. That is to say, his training must be such as shall help him to diminish as much as possible the social bonds which limit his activity.”
—Maria Montessori (1870–1952)
“Television does not dominate or insist, as movies do. It is not sensational, but taken for granted. Insistence would destroy it, for its message is so dire that it relies on being the background drone that counters silence. For most of us, it is something turned on and off as we would the light. It is a service, not a luxury or a thing of choice.”
—David Thomson, U.S. film historian. America in the Dark: The Impact of Hollywood Films on American Culture, ch. 8, William Morrow (1977)