We recently watched the three-part Ken Burns PBS documentary “Prohibition” (available on Netflix) and found it a fascinating historical glimpse into how social norms and mores can dramatically shift. The events are interesting context for our present time, when conceptions about morality, politics, acceptable business practices and what is deemed socially acceptable are once more on the move. It’s fair to say that the pendulum of human behavior and thinking is constantly swinging from one extreme to the other. While balance and moderation are optimal, it’s important to note that they tend to be rare and always at risk.
PROHIBITION is a three-part, five-and-a-half-hour documentary film series directed by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick that tells the story of the rise, rule, and fall of the Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the entire era it encompassed.
Prohibition was intended to improve, even to ennoble, the lives of all Americans, to protect individuals, families, and society at large from the devastating effects of alcohol abuse. But the enshrining of a faith-driven moral code in the Constitution paradoxically caused millions of Americans to rethink their definition of morality. Here is a direct video link to the trailer.
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