Originally Posted by Ciment
When we are speaking of recognized family. Recognized by whom are we speaking about, Sicily or NY Bonanno family ?


Ideally we'd want some sort of recognition from one of the American Families since we're talking about Montreal here but recognition from Sicily would be helpful too.

Originally Posted by Ciment
Originally Posted by NYMafia
Originally Posted by Ciment
Next question I am throwing out there in the open, can a local family decide to start it's own mafia ?


The correct answer is an unequivocal no!


The reason I asked is not to entrap anyone ; everyone's opinion is valuable.
I am often torn about what makes a criminal group a mafia or not and that is why this question was asked and also to get different ideas from others as to whether it's a misconception or not.
The Stidda and the Sacre Corona Unita were created much later and many criminologists in Italy have referred to them as Mafias. Then I ask myself the question, if someone creates a criminal organized here in North America what makes them not a mafia ? Isn't that what the earlier Mafioso's from Italy did when they immigrated to America ?


Bit of a complicated question. If we want to get technical Mafia only refers to Cosa Nostra. The word has been bastardized so much that it went from only Cosa Nostra to other Italian organized crime groups to any ethnic organized crime groups. When people use Mafia almost everyone acknowledges that you're using it in a general sense to refer to a particular organized crime group.


Last edited by Mafia101; 07/30/23 02:35 PM.