Why was Absinthe banned ?
On October 08, 2007 in Back to basic
Because that stuff makes you crazy!! After all, the French slogan goes “Absinthe rend fou!”, and they ought to know, right?
One French politician who supported the ban claimed that if absinthe remained legal, half the population would eventually be employed in fitting the remaining half with straightjackets as a result. The facts are less lurid. A number of purportedly scientific studies performed in France in the latter half of the 19th century claimed to prove that absinthe was harmful to human health. The foremost of the researchers who carried out these studies was one Dr. Valentin Magnan, whose specialties were alcoholism and insanity. Due in large part to the efforts of Dr. Magnan and his supporters, a political struggle ensued between the liquor industry on one side and prohibitionists on the other. The prohibitionists were eventually victorious, forcing the passage of laws that banned the manufacture and sale of absinthe in Switzerland in 1910, in France in 1915, and in many other western countries in which it was popular, including the United States in 1912. It must be noted that in some countries, such as Spain, Portugal, and Britain, absinthe was never banned.