Temptation

In the 1960s and 70s, the American Mafia resulted to something they vowed to never indulge in – drugs. Heroin. Prior this new business venture for the Mafioso, the commission of all the major Mafia Families had always shunned the world of drugs, preferring to stick to more traditional ways of making money illegally in the form of rackets, heists and gambling. Drugs were seen as dirty, dishonourable – only fit for peddling in the rough neighbourhoods of inner city ethnic minorities. However, since the conception of man, since Adam and Eve, temptation has always been one of the most predominate Achilles Heels of the mind, body and soul.

The huge, almost inconceivable profits the drug trade offered was the Mafia’s ultimate temptation – it was what saw the collective Italian crime outfit make in excess of 20 billion dollars per annum as they sold heroin transported from the rolling, rural hills of Sicily in the congested boroughs of New York and many more US cities. Temptation wasn’t the only thing that made the Mafia make more money than they knew what to do with – it was also what ultimately crippled and eventually destroyed them.

Not a lot of people give a fuck if you’re making a few dollars hosting illegal card games or running one or two rackets. But people do tend to give a fuck when you’re making much more money than global corporations and you’re filling the streets with poison. The Mafia knew that selling drugs didn’t only bring much more law enforcement on their operation, but they knew that the cardinal rule was that if you were caught selling drugs, then the same people you broke bread with would be the same people that would put a bullet in your brain. There was too much at stake to leave the risk of someone talking to the FBI, bringing down the entire organization in exchange for full immunity.

But did all those considerations that should have spurned reservations, stop them? Nope. Why? Temptation – the thought of making more money in a single month than you’ve ever made in your entire life is tempting, right . . . right? You know it is. Put yourself in a Mafia Capo’s (captain) shoes. You’re already engaged in illegal activity, even though the legal and traditional ramifications in rackets and gambling are nowhere near as disastrous as being busted with 50 pounds of heroin. Back to the point – are you telling me if you were an ambitious Mafia capo and you knew you could make more than a million dollars by shifting the 50 pounds of H on your desk, you wouldn’t do it? I’ll be honest – I would.

I would not because I’m particularly ruthless or cavalier, but because I’m a human being who has succumbed to temptation in many forms. So have you. It may be the little temptations you don’t even notice – instead of doing an assignment for university that’s due in tomorrow, you procrastinate and decide to watch a movie. Just like Adam and Eve and the Apple and the Snake, the temptation of fun entertainment that will whisk you away from the bollocks that is reality has prevailed over you.

And she’s laughing – this wicked, cunning temptress is laughing at you cause she knows she’s got you. She knows that you’re just like the Mafia – you’ll make promises which, in the face of the sexy rewards temptation offers, will melt like a naked chocolate bar in the Sahara Desert.