I will say this, the counting the number of made guys thing is not really a good method for determining the strength of the families. Mainly cause it can be deceptive. Not that it shouldn't be used,but not as the main criteria...

Furio made the observation that Detroit is organized like an ndrangheta family, astute observation. Blood ties, and control of Enterprises, not territory controlled by made men. I'd be willing to bet, not many people can give an accurate description of families organized like this. It's why we had the Rizzuto thread. That might explain the erratic membership numbers and charts. How many " made guys " in Toronto? I don't think any of us really knows, a direct consequence of how they are organized.


Case in point, in the other thread, about the Bonnanos Christmas party;
One of the posters, ralphie made an observation that they have too many crews, and how smart or successful could these guys be, meeting in broad daylight at a strip mall restaurant. I feel like some guys, see this and say, they are doing fine, cause they replaced a bunch of members, but to me they look to be taking a Rico sooner rather than later. Contrast this to the secretive close knit, blood relative model, like you haven't seen any indictments, and you probably won't see any for awhile...


A Guy like Chicago Tony, made his money in the street, now too rich and legit and savvy to be caught doing anything that will get him heavy time, he seems cut from the same mold as a Crea, who you won't hear about until they are ready to lock up the whole family... It's why depending only on indictments can be, again deceiving.




Another thing I feel is lost on a lot of people, only in New York, is it actually Neccessary to KEEP making guys, because there are five gangs and not one. Like Ivey you always talk about the size of NY and stuff, but trust, if there was a continuation of gang wars like in Chicago, if they would have fought until all the gangs were consolidated into one, even if this family was a thousand made guys, they woulda never made another guy. Why would they? If they established an absence of competition? One guy dies, another guy woulda picked up the rackets, and they would never replace him. This is the real reason why mob membership numbers dwindle in cities not NY, not cause they have that much more criminal acumen, (they got brokesters in the genovese too) but because there was only one gang, no need. You got a hundred guys, ten die, the other 90 are gonna split what they left behind, not go gung-ho and make ten guys just to make em rich, only if they were family I see it happening....




Why would you take a pie that is say 50 pieces for 50 guys and make 50 more guys and cut the pie into 100 pieces? Those made guys don't automatically add revenue to the family, that's Moltisanti thinking. You make those guys and now those 50 made men gotta split what they got with the new guys, hence the need for sit downs to stop violence. This is why they HAVE to keep the numbers static. And why you will occasionally see families try to cheat and add more members than they are allowed.



Think of the meeting between Gotti and Chin, where Chin was holding off on making guys, probably cause it was making the other soldiers and capos richer as they can take a bigger slice. But he had to relent cause of the pressure from Gotti, what happens when Gotti sends a soldier to muscle the associate that's not made? It goes to the table and the associate probably loses, most of the time. In cities outside NY, after competition was eliminated, there was no reason to keep making guys. This sort of explains the 30 ,40 guys, they never really needed more than that I think. And for the record, I find it funny 30 made guys is considered a lot, lol. Like Detroit can't produce 30, 40 guys? Why? Seriously..


Again I gotta reference my post on the Rizzutos, when I talked of the differences between a Family in say Palermo vs one in like Siculiana. The Palermo guys have things to extort, land,citrus markets, construction, business in general, and this is the purpose of the made guys, to extract revenue from the territory. One guy out, another is waiting to fill the void. In Siculiana, you could make guys till their whole hands were bleeding and you ran out of Saint cards, it would not increase the revenue from the territory of Siculiana. They can't just go into Palermo and muscle in, so they gotta migrate. See made men do them no good, they need enterprises to control, drugs ,cigarettes, some form of commodity to sell


I see the same difference in like a Detroit vs a NY. Its like you are comparing a Siculiana type family (Enterprise, selling or controlling a commodity, blood relations) with a Palermo family (Power, extortion, military type command, everyone is just a crook operating under an umbrella). This is why you saw Detroit as a big power in Narcotics early on, you saw guys like Coppola in like three four cities in the Midwest, NO, Mexico, he's everywhere, cause he has to be in order to be successful, and where is he from? Partinico, the sticks lol.





So my points;
1. Detroit is still a family, like what the fuck..
2. Detroit is not a big family, like, what the fuck
3. Detroit cause of the way it's organized, by blood or marriage, is hard to make an indictment against, also hard to identify all the "made" guys, ( gambling is easy, just follow the gamblers lol)
4. I don't think Detroit have ever NEEDED a lot of soldiers, cause they never had competition in Detroit from another family, plus they were high level narcotics dealers for a long time, I already outlined that effect on a family long term...

5. Y'all should leave GR alone on this shit, cause I see lots of people interested in say, the Philly fam, which is more soap opera than mob family,but NO ONE says they ain't a family, this is after the Natale fiasco, which just baffles me, lol
And no one tries to just shut down the thread, we look a New Years Eve pics and admire Joeys hair....