Does the Italian Mafia exist anymore?
I watch the Godfather movies all the time. I own the trilogy and LOVE them so much.. I was just wondering if any of it were true? Or do you all know of any mafia that might still exsist there? Does it affect you or no? I know Italy is smaller than the USA, so if there is Mafia, it might be harder to avoid it than if you were in the States.
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If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed - Albert Einstein
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Of course it exists. It is one of our oldest traditions. Not one most of us are really proud of, but it's like flies. No matter what you do, you won't kill them all.
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How can I believe in God when just last week I got my tongue caught in the roller of an electric typewriter? --Woody Allen
Mafia does exist but it's a multinational organization, not just an italian one. Who do you think import drugs in your countries, Santa Claus?
Good traditions should be kept alive.
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Daar is de lente, daar is de zon
bijna, maar ik denk dat ze weldra zal komen.
De fallus impudicus staat al in bloei
En de blaadjes krijgen bomen.
M'n vrouw en m'n kat zijn allebei krols
en de klokken vertrekken naar Rome
@ deng It doesn't seem that there is somebody or something really endangering mafia, not our politicians for sure, mafia can be very useful when there are elections. I imagine that the "good tradition" has still a long life....
Mafia, Camorra, ' Ndrangheta, Sacra Corona Unita are organizations which represent in South Italy a State in the State. They will survive till the political world will be drenched and till the people conspiracy of silence will continue. Therefore I believe forever. But crime exist everywhere: USA, Russia, Japan teach in purpose...
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"..take me as I am.."
@ deng & el1973 : 
well said...
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\"There is no way to happiness...Happiness is the Way...\"(Buddha)
I just read a book "Cosa Nostra" about Sicilian mafia. Oh yes it does exist! And its much tougher than the one in New York.
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~*The average woman would rather have beauty than brains because the average man can see better than he can think 
*~
Yeah,stills survive-changing style of operations,
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"ALL SOULS WERE CREATED EQUALLY,NO ONE ABOVE OTHERS" "BEING WHITE DOEST MEANT PURITY EITHER BLACK BE DARKENED,SOMETIMES NATURE RESEMBLANCES ONES"
The Mafia exists and is now an international organization, not only Italian. But we must not think only boss more like those "the Godfather", the mafia now operates more as a company that makes money in several fields.
In recent years there have been many steps forward, with the arrest of several family boss, especially in Sicily, but now the most dangerous has become the 'Ndrangheta, which is considered the largest worldwide. The tragedy of mid-August in germany is unfortunately started from my land, Calabria, the real strength of mafias is the silence.
Their work in shade.
Mafia is everywhere in the world. In some parts, like Sicily they almost openly practice their powers; In other places they work differently. Like antwerp, near central station they have a lot of restaurants and all that. Those restaurants don't earn much, but that's fine for money laundry. who do you think brings most Mexicans to US? it's not charity organisations. I recently heard a story about the Chinese community in belgium. Some people starting up 'protection'. Didn't seem to work out though.
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Daar is de lente, daar is de zon
bijna, maar ik denk dat ze weldra zal komen.
De fallus impudicus staat al in bloei
En de blaadjes krijgen bomen.
M'n vrouw en m'n kat zijn allebei krols
en de klokken vertrekken naar Rome
i heard on the news a few months ago Mafia Is Biggest Business in Italy
Organized Crime Is Largest Segment of Italian Economy, which aroun 80% of the economy Revenue from organized crime amounts to an estimated $127 billion annually in Italy
which is quite terrible but sayin that organized crime and corruption has always been a problem even people of high power like Silvio Berlusconi have big links to the mafia familys
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oooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhh
mafia is economic and politic power.............. other are criminal managed by this powers and no more else........bye
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pacpan@inwind.it
If you still have doubts about their existence, ask Duisburg's habitants ! 6 Italians were shot dead (all shot in the head) by the notoriously violent Calabrian mafia last summer. It was shocking for the quite peaceful German community...
Oh, what would be Italy without its Mafia ? 
'Good' traditions should be kept alive ! Well said Deng.
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Je grimperai sur l'espace lumineux,
Je traverserai l'esprit de la terre,
Je cheminerai dans la lumière
Et j'atteindrai l'étoile.
Jokes apart, it's a plague that has to be fought against. Unfortunately, as el1973 said before, it's just quite unlikely that this old tradition will stop shortly.
As for Duisburg, a small precision: it wasn't mafia but another criminal organisation called 'ndrangheta (yeah, let's give the devil its due, or as we say it in Italy, diamo a Cesare quel che è di Cesare (let's give Caesar his due) ). What makes me sad is that the image of Italy the comes out of news like such hides completely the good that's in this country, contributing more and more to the definition "Italians = Mafia"...
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\"There is no way to happiness...Happiness is the Way...\"(Buddha)
we need mafia to liveeeee 
it would disaster if mafia ends 
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i wish this life will end soon for me....
@__loovetodo__: is there mafia in Turkey too?
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\"There is no way to happiness...Happiness is the Way...\"(Buddha)
we need mafia to liveeeee it would disaster if mafia ends :(
it would disaster if mafia ends :(With this you say that we need wars among peoples to live
With this you say that we need wars among peoples to live
You ancestors used to say : Si vis pacem para bellum ! (If you want peace prepare for war) 
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Je grimperai sur l'espace lumineux,
Je traverserai l'esprit de la terre,
Je cheminerai dans la lumière
Et j'atteindrai l'étoile.
Mafia is everywhere in the world.
I disagree. If organized crime exists everywhere, the mafia (if we define it as a very powerful and rich criminal organization. A hierarchic one with a quite important support in the government, a strong nuisance capacity...) doesn't exist everywhere. But we all know the Russian mafia, The Japanese Yakuza, The Chinese triads, Hispanic cartels...
The Italian authorities have a lot of trouble with them for many reasons : Officially they're businessmen ! They have legal activities as a cover but also as a way for money laundering...They could afford the best lawyers, they have allies in the government, in the police...
If I have to talk it's about the Mafia's activities in Algeria; our local "Pablo Escobar" -pursued by several foreign police forces in the world- was recently arrested by interpol ! The main business is drug. Our 'mafia' is exporting 800 tonnes/per year to Europe and the middle East. Algeria is a country of transit. This drug is mainly coming from our lovely western neighbor. It's nothing compared to the 47.400 tonnes/per year produced by Morocco ! (The First producer of Cannabis in the world). For us it's impossible to totally control 6 427 km of land frontiers (shared with 7 countries). Some experts also said that drug's income is possibly funding terrorism.
As for Duisburg, a small precision: it wasn't mafia but another criminal organisation called 'ndrangheta (yeah, let's give the devil its due, or as we say it in Italy, diamo a Cesare quel che è di Cesare (let's give Caesar his due)
). What makes me sad is that the image of Italy the comes out of news like such hides completely the good that's in this country, contributing more and more to the definition "Italians = Mafia"...Thanks for the precision...
Newspapers love sensational headlines ! Who would be interested about positive things ? One man's joy is another man's sorrow. Newspapers make huge profit in the times of war/high criminality (due to the massive publicity).
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Je grimperai sur l'espace lumineux,
Je traverserai l'esprit de la terre,
Je cheminerai dans la lumière
Et j'atteindrai l'étoile.
With this you say that we need wars among peoples to live
You ancestors used to say : Si vis pacem para bellum ! (If you want peace prepare for war)
Also my ancestors could err
http://pinomasciari.org/COMUNICATOStampaMasciari31-03-08ing.pdf
Here you can find a press release of a Calabrian entrepreneur who has not surrendered to the 'ndrangheta.
If someone know the Italian can visit his web site and leave a message
Here another interesting story about a Sicilian businessmen openly defying Mafia. He is refusing to pay for 'protection'.
http://www.katu.com/news/national/13766102.html
He hired bodyguards to protect him from potential reprisals.
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Je grimperai sur l'espace lumineux,
Je traverserai l'esprit de la terre,
Je cheminerai dans la lumière
Et j'atteindrai l'étoile.
We have seen some examples of opposition to 'ndrangheta in Calabria (Pino Masciari, in the post of Athlas - sorry I couldn't find anything in english), to mafia (Rodolfo Guajana, in the post of SkyPiercer), now let me spend a couple of words about a woman, Silvana Fucito, who's fighting against camorra near Naples. She refused to pay the mob and as a consequence she's got her paint shop burnt. She didn't surrender and she went on fighting. The Time magazine listed her among the 35 European Heroes in 2005. Here you can find an article in English about her, but you sure can find more on the net...
http://www.time.com/time/europe/hero2005/fucito.html
Individuals can do something against criminal organisations such as mafia & related, groups of people (especially young people) are popping up to react against them, but I guess sometimes the fear (for those having to choose to pay the pizzo or not) and the crave for money (for those who should protect people!) are still hard to fight...
__________________________
\"There is no way to happiness...Happiness is the Way...\"(Buddha)
we need mafia to liveeeee
That may sound like a paradox but there is some truth about it. In my area (Naples) a lot of people have the only chance of working if they are involved in illegal activities linked more or less to organized crime. I am not talking only about drug traffic and other major criminal activities, but about a lot of collateral activities more or less directly linked to criminal organizations, like the selling of fake high fashion items , pirate CDs and software, cigarettes and so on. Without that, many of those people would not have a way to survive. I do not mean to justify organized crime, but those discourses that we hear from politicians like "It is the organized crime that is hindering the development of southern regions" and so on, stink of hipocrisy. Mafia is a useful alibi to justify the failures of the policies aimed at developing the southern regions of Italy and even admitting that that claim was true, which in the best possible case is only partly true I think, whose duty is it to fight organized crime? If the main responsible for the economic problems of southern Italy are criminal organizations, why not to fight them effectively? Politicians have made those discourses for 60 year, it would be high time to act. Why nobody does anything? Maybe because that, for some politicians at least, would mean to shoot their own foot? Now there is an electoral campaign going on and a few days ago one of the major candidates pompously declared in Sicily "If you are a mafioso, do not vote for us, because our aim is to destroy you!!". He lost another good opportunity to shut up. "Camorra is involved in the dramatic situation of the garbage in Naples". Great, someone finally realized that? And why did it happen? Could have it happened without the cooperation of the local authorities? No...but it's been for a while that "siamo caduti in.... bassolino"
mafia is a natural law : mafia plugged lack of real state ! in other place of the world or Italia place it could be associative system, it's also a litle bit cultural answer according to local traditions actually...I suppose ! But.... in same way I have some trouble about american's DEA organization ! Lol
Godfather is a nice movie......but only a movie.
In italy mafias is system.....for example ......to work you have to know somebody.....to take an accademic degree or pay or sex.
Sons of the high society can work, also if they are only some stupid, becouse here we have social class like india o worste.
For this razon many excellent italian brains have to go away.
Criminal system is wanted from italian state, so can manage proxtitutions, drug and every criminal acts that in a modern society need
Mafias aren't a romantic things .......it's only dirty business where many italians take part
I just read a book "Cosa Nostra" about Sicilian mafia. Oh yes it does exist! And its much tougher than the one in New York.
It certainly alive and well here in Canada, Canada? Heck! its right here in the city where I live. The cafe where I have my expresso is a local for a few of them. 
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THE CHRISTIAN LIFE WITHOUT PRAYER IS LIKE COMPUTER HARDWARE WITHOUT THE SOFTWARE!!!!!
Of course it still exhist.. and actually it is at the government in Italy
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Giovanni
Of course it still exhist.. and actually it is at the government in Italy
Here in Canada too,
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THE CHRISTIAN LIFE WITHOUT PRAYER IS LIKE COMPUTER HARDWARE WITHOUT THE SOFTWARE!!!!!
ah yes i have been to italy many times and there is still a mafia there, I heard that just a couple of months ago around 15 family members in Neapol were killed. In Sicily for example mafia still exists, and most of the local people know who is in the mafia and who is not, but the role of the mafia has changed and now they are trying to make the local people feel safe.In Sicily there is almost no crime because the mafia is keeping the streets safe
I heard that from lokal ppl :-)