What Truly Constitutes a Mafia Member as a Rat

Knockaround guys in general, and mobbed-up guys in particular, are supposed to carry themselves with a certain decorum and ambiance. This aura is truly supposed to be part of their very ’essence’ and built deep inside their core being. For most of these so-called goodfellas nowadays, nothing could be further from the truth.

What makes a guy a rat? Specifically what makes a guy a mob rat? I mean a tried and true goodfella. You know em, don’t you? Those guys who wanna pride themselves on having had their fingers pinched and their palms burned, but then turn around and become stool pigeons.

The guys who strutted around town like they were stars while abusing others only to later collapse like accordions and broken down valises once their mob status became a bit inconvenient for them.

There’s an old saying that goes like this, “there’s no honor amongst thieves.” Well that’s not entirely true. Not at all. At least not in all cases. Especially years back where people in general seemed to have carried themselves with a little more honor and a little more grace than people do nowadays. The same holds very true in the underworld. Years ago most mob guys were so fuckin proud to have gotten straightened out that they revered that ‘button’ and would have swallowed a poison pill before dishonoring themselves and their family surname.

Most legitimate people really have no concept of what I speak of. And they don’t really have a clue about the American underworld or the true mentality of what a real knock-around guy and racketeer is supposed to have. How they are truly supposed to conduct themselves. This holds especially true of what a made mafioso should be. Nowadays most goodfellas don’t even know what the fuck it truly means to be a goodfella. These guys are lost in space and just wanna play gangster until they get a kick in the ass. Then they quickly wanna change up the program.

Knockaround guys in general, and mobbed-up guys in particular, are supposed to carry themselves with a certain decorum and ambiance. This aura is truly supposed to be part of their very ’essence’ and built deep inside their core being. For most of these so-called goodfellas nowadays, nothing could be further from the truth.

It should NOT be a facade. They should NOT be “good time Charlies.” They should NOT be bullshitters who strut around like tough guys until the shit hits the fan and then run like thieves in the night into the arms of the FBI. That’s NOT what a wiseguy or a mafioso is supposed to be made of….Not in theory anyway.

In the last two or three decades, and especially in the recent past, we all too often hear about these so-called “former” mafia members belly-aching about how they were short changed financially. How they got their monies and assets robbed off the streets by other mob guys while they were away doing a bid. Or how they were wronged in some other manner and therefore are now justified in having “flipped” to the government and put former friends in jail….I’m calling total bullshit on all of that!

If you cannot do the jail time then don’t fuck around in the streets. If you can do jail time, but you don’t wanna do a wheelbarrow of time, then stay the fuck away from narcotics and other heavy rackets that carry draconian prison terms in the double-digits and better.

If another mob guy made a move on your woman, or he straight-up robbed you blind, or set you up in some other manner to abuse you. Then go get your capo or the consigliere and call for a ‘table’ to open this guys ass up for him because you’re in the right. Or if you don’t wanna do that, or can’t do that, then go out and crack his coconut with a baseball bat. If for whatever reason you can’t do that, but it’s still a big problem, then go cop a sneak on the guy. Clip em and fuck em…problem solved!

You got robbed? You got set up? You got disrespected? Go do what you gotta do!…… But don’t turn around and become a rat! Because no matter what ‘white-washed’ cleansed label you wanna use to refer to yourself as, such as informer, government cooperator, cooperating witness, turncoat, tattletale, Benedict Arnold, traitor, or a hundred other more benign names. Essentially you are nothing but a fucking stool pigeon. A fucking rat bastard! And there is NO sugarcoating it…Period!

There is NO reason to ever become a rat!

I take that back. In 99.9% of all the cases where we read about some mobster becoming an informant, he had other options. Percentage-wise, one iota of one percent, out of a hundred situations, a fella may have had no options left open to him. His situation and that of his blood family might have been so precarious and dangerous for his wife and children and such, that the G was the only place left to run. But as I say that's an extremely rare occurrence. In the other 99.9% of all cases, there are always better options than selling your soul and your honor down the drain by becoming a traitor and informant.

Regardless of what these low life degenerates say to try and paint themselves in a better light, most times the real reasons why a guy becomes an informant is self-serving and selfish at best. Plain and simple!

He may be in a legal bind where he has been arrested or is facing indictment for a series of crimes that he knows he’ll be convicted of, and he doesn’t wanna go to prison so he becomes a rat. Or maybe he has been out on the street robbing everybody and cheating his friends in various ways, and now he’s afraid they’ve found out about his disloyalty and he fears for his life. So he rats. Or maybe he has been acting in underhanded ways that we call being ’subversive.’ This is mob terminology for a guy who goes around talking behind the backs of his friends in the borgata. He is trying to undermine them with his words and is basically being disloyal and plotting against them with whatever he might be saying and doing. And of course there are a million other little reasons that could lead to a former hoodlum or racketeer justifying his actions for becoming a rat.

But in the end there really is NO satisfactory justification for it. Especially a guy who has walked into that darkened room and allowed his ‘compare’ to draw blood from his trigger finger and drip it onto a holy card while he pledges his undying lifelong loyalty to his friends until the day he takes his last breath. NO justification at all!

Don’t get me wrong. Cosa Nostra is no cakewalk. It never was. And there are a ton of creepy fucks involved with it. The true trustworthy and honorable mafiosi are far and few between. Despite what laypersons and even many street guys may think, it is a hard life. Decades ago there were more benefits to becoming a goodfella as opposed to today. But by the same token there was also a lot more responsibilities and obligations that came along with that ‘button’ they pinned on your chest.

But the ‘quality’ of recruit was also much better. Much more sturdy. Nowadays most of these so-called tough guys are anything put. They are paper mache’ mobsters who want the perceived benefits of membership, but none of the obligations and downsides they may also face with it. And at the first sign of any real trouble they fly the coup. Often times into the wanting arms and smiling faces of FBI agents.

The proof is in the pudding as they say.

These cretins empty their bellies and spill every secret they know about family, friends, and the associates who were affiliated with them in the rackets for years. In many cases lifelong fiends and even blood family. They know damn well that their words will help to send their comrades to prison, and leave the wives and children of these family members and friends destitute and abandoned. But they are willing to throw everybody under the bus so that the informant can get off scot free. They basically ‘buy’ their own freedom by having others incarcerated instead of themselves.

Now I ask you, how the hell is any of that in any way, shape, or form, an ‘honorable’ thing to do? And how the hell are their actions accepted and even entertained and enjoyed in some circles?

After getting on the witness stand and ‘ratting’ on their fellow members and personal friends and family, they fade into the WITSEC program and start new lives with the government providing subsidies such as housing, monthly paychecks and money, health care and other benefits, far away from where they left their carnage and collateral damage back in New York and elsewhere.

Nowadays they even go on the ‘touring circuit’ where they give lectures to college kids and sports teams about the dangers of the mob. Many claim they’ve found religion. Lol…yeah! They did. Right after the feds came a knocking at their doors. It’s all BS. Many have gone so far as to become media darling with their own websites, podcasts, and television shows. While all the while, hidden behind the curtain, is all the devastation they have caused innocent people, and even other racket guys who were once their buddies, who trusted and believed in them.

Could there be any lower form of scum? I doubt it.

Without naming names there was one Gambino member, a soldier who later rose to a capo post. He justified his becoming a rat because he said while away for a year in the can his crew buddies and higher-ups robbed his money off the street. Know what I say? Big fucking deal. Go do your jail bid and when you get paroled, either confront the guys who robbed you, or forget about it. Or leave the life. That’s your choice. And each of those three choices were much more honorable than becoming a rat which is what you are. But in realty that was all window dressing. He just didn’t wanna do any more jail time so he ratted! The rest of what he said is all false justification for his bottom feeder actions.

Or the former Colombo member who is the equivalent of the mob’s “Little Lord Fauntleroy.” Basically a suburban spoiled brat, and a guy who had a silver spoon sticking out of his ass all his life. He became a big man on campus for a few years through the considerable influence of his father. When he was finally arrested for a slew of frauds and other offenses he had perpetrated, he quickly turned rodent and informed on everybody and anybody the feds wanted him to spill on. His claim and excuse was that he had suddenly ‘found’ religion, And that he was in love with a young girl he’d met. The truth? He just couldn’t take being behind prison walls. He had no backbone!…He says that he never actually testified on the stand against another made man. Do you know what I say? Do you wanna know what “The Street” says?

In “This Life.” In the street. In the underworld. Whether you testify against another Italian associate or member in the mafia. Or an Irishman or Jew, a Frenchman, or Black guy, it makes absolutely no difference at all. I don’t care if you testified against a stumble bum, or a Hobo on the Bowery. If you pointed a finger at anyone for law enforcement, then you are a complete, unadulterated stool pigeon and rat motherfucker. Period!

Or the Lucchese member who now sports a podcast and website. This particular fellow wasn’t under arrest or indictment, or even under investigation at the time that he ran to the FBI. Why did he become a rat? He was copping delusions that his former friends wanted to whack him. Whether thats true or not is absolutely, positively, no good excuse to become a stool pigeon. Because all he had to do was run away (AND stay away). Go live your life in another state. Before long these fellows wouldn’t have even remembered his name, or given a fuck about where he was. But NO! He had to become a rat. Why???

Despite what he says, he may have had an ax to grind with certain members and associates. Because he seems a bit vindictive. He could have just faded off the scene instead of making federal cases out of it (literally LOL). It’s actually extremely stupid of him if you really, really, think about it.

I could go on and on all day dissecting all the bullshit these and other police informants throw out as their justifications for turning on their former lifestyle, their family, and their friends...but as I say, in the end result 99.9% of all their excuses are hollow and empty.

A rat is a rat!…End of story.

PS: I just wanna know one thing from them. When they look in the mirror to shave in the morning. How the fuck do they stand the image that stares them back from the mirror?

Until the next time…”The Other Guy!”

What Truly Constitutes a Mafia Member as a Rat

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What Truly Constitutes a Mafia Member as a Rat

Unlock This Door to the Underworld

Take the Journey!

You May Also Enjoy

Racketeer Snapshot: Connecticut’s Frank (The Cigar) Piccolo

The Anthony Strollo Regime of NY/NJ

The Day Charlie (the Bug) Workman Saved a Horse

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