During our studies of prohibition, I noticed that
prohibition was often romanticized. When we looked at a painting depicting
blacks in a speakeasy in American Literature and American Studies, everyone in
the painting looked extremely happy and joyous. During this time period, the
whole ideal of “American” changed. It was seen as cool and interesting to do
illegal things like drink in speakeasies and to be a bootlegger. This often led
to the glorification of criminals, such as Al Capone, during the time period.
When people think of the 20s nowadays, they think of days of glory and wealth:
times when nobody had a care in the world and only wanted to party and have
fun. Since prohibition occurred during this time period of happiness, it was
glorified as well.
However, prohibition should not have been glorified
as it brought up a lot of questions about what Americans believed morally. When we read The Great Gatsby, it was clear
that those that knew Gatsby were in awe of him: from his lavish lifestyle to
his extravagant parties. Most of those people didn’t even care that Gatsby
attained his money illegally even though they knew that he was involved in
bootlegging. This shows us how Americans thought it was okay to achieve wealth
in any way possible and not necessarily in the most moral way possible.
Additionally, prohibition brought up a lot of issues for many people. It
enforced the ideas that immigrants needed to be civilized and Germans had to be
repressed by serving as Anti- Germany propaganda. Therefore, I believe that prohibition is
often glorified, even thought it should not be, because the 1920s was a period
of time that was greatly glorified.
