My family has been, as far back as anyone can remember, involved with organized crime (in every concievable way). We are just recently beginning to come out of "the business." While we are no longer part of organized crime and we don't endorse it, we do respect the organization and its traditions, ect. We, unlike many Italian-Americans, embrace it as an important part of our past and Sicilian heritage. We are snubbed by Italian-American "pride clubs." We are only embraced by other Sicilians whose ancestors were involved with the Mafia. It seems that we aren't Italian-Americans, we are Sicilian Mafia descendants.
I was curious to see how other Italian-Americans feel about this although this may not be the place to ask...