It actually wasn't tame at all. If anything societys way tamer now. The media was super clean but the sh%^ that went down in person was wilder. No cameras everywhere, no high tech equipment, police would just walk a block w a stick and use a whistle to call others which wasnt that safe or effective. Ppl would get into fights regularly and little was done about it. The law enforcement was so lax that Bonnie and Clyde were able to pretty much get the exact technology used by them and go on a spree(this later forced a revision in their approach). Coca cola used to have cocaine in it and you could get morphine in over the counter cough syrups along w all sorta crazy sh$%.
No now we look wild on TV but are way calmer and more restricted in person.
I agree, to a certain degree, in that media was not everywhere but the introduction of jazz (paired with other things, like movies and post War consciousness) influenced the culture. It got so extreme that Hollywood put censorship code on movies, and when you watch pre code films (1929), there is nudity, sex, violent crime, drug use, etc. Society's curators knew the effect of film and music on the psyche, and that is why they then put a ban, to the point where you could not show a man and women sleeping in the same bed and they always had two different beds. When the code was lifted, society started going nuts again: promiscuity, drug use, divorce rates, violence, etc all went up.
All those things you mentioned did exist pre 20's, but it was no where near as bad as it got in the roaring 20's; and if we are arguing from a music influence on society, although jazz existed pre 20's, it did not become really a staple in wide spread culture until then. I don't have the chart, but I recall seeing a comparison in music history class of illegitimate births pre and post the 20's in the places Jazz was prominent (cities), and it went up wildly, only to settle down after the Hollywood code was put in to place for a while. Societies will always have their problems but to what extent and how widespread is a different issue. The elites still listen to Beethoven and go chill in the woods (worshipping owls often), but they want the people dumbed down, on drugs, on welfare and in soft slavery, as they keep all the good stuff for them, as they fund everything from importing drugs in the country to the music us peasants listen too - i.e. How the Rothschilds were the biggest funders of Jazz music.
Interesting you mention the Coca Cola thing because my grandfather owned a drug store and when he sold it, he took all the antique bottles from the basement, with many ranging back to civil war. There were bottles of opium, morphine, and other hardcore types of stuff that you did not need a prescription for. My friend wanted to try the opium from 1850, so he did,.......bad idea........and then turned green and threw up for about 2 hours straight <Lmaoo>
