> Maybe people at the time had other prerogatives or they had more fun with opium and alcohol?

Haha who knows. I guess a global cultural/and social change probably made people less "responsible". So this mandated a ban? Doesn't look so sound.

I guess there are some issues which most people don't wanna touch on. The constant demonisation made it a taboo. If some people feel there's some vested interest behind it, we don't have solid proof. But feelings/intuition doesn't need such proofs ;)