>visit Italy last year>take rental car down the heel part of the country>park somewhere at night>some hobo wearing a suit tells me he will "protect the car for the night" for 5 euros>say yes, because I'm thinking he might be a mafia memberItaly bros, be honest. Did I get scammed?
DO (you) really think someone who's mobbed up would do low paying crap like that?
>>221639020did he protect the car for the night?
>>221639020>mafia>5 euro>protecting carsyeah because that´s the business model of the mafia in Italy. Protecting tourist cars for 5€
>>221639054It was basically africa down there, so maybe>>221639076he did, he waited for me the next morning and said it was all good
>>221639020you got scammedthe mafia will seldom target tourists, they bring in money
>>221639020TL;DR: Yeah you got scammed, I'm sorry dude...Btw it's a very specific low-level Italian street hustle, not the mafia. What you encountered is a classic "parcheggiatore abusivo" (unauthorised parking attendant), they hang around in towns especially in the south and in tourist areas and offer to "watch" your car for a few euros. The implied threat is that if you don't pay something might happen to it and sometimes they themselves are the ones who cause damage. The suit was probably just part of the act to seem more legitimate?? Don't know. The whole setup is a soft extortion racket which kinda feels organised-crime-adjacent but in reality these are usually just petty opportunists and not made men.
>>221639830>The implied threat is that if you don't pay something might happen to it and sometimes they themselves are the ones who cause damagewouldn't that be illegal? why would he risk getting into trouble with the law for not getting 5 euros?
>>221639910>southern Italy>"the law"
>>221639910Of course it's illegal but the risk of real legal trouble is almost 0 because the threat is implied and not explicit which makes it unprovable in court. If the guy says "ayo gibs me 5 euros I'll protect yo car n shieet" and you pay, that's technically a consensual (if coerced) transaction. If you later find a scratch you can't prove he did it, cops know the racket but rarely have a winnable case unless the guy is caught in the act of vandalism and tourists rarely report it because they are gone the next day. Locals know the situation and often just pay this annoyance tax to avoid hassle. No complaint = no investigation. In cities where this shit is endemic (Naples, Palermo, Bari, etc) a lone guy hustling parking spots is low on the list compared to burglaries, violent crime or organized crime and so many forces unofficially tolerate it as long as there's no open aggression, because cracking down constantly would be a never ending game with low lifes who have nothing to lose
>>221639020you did the right thing, he would have scratched the car ( dunno if its a problem if its rented). 5 euro is a bit too much thou they generallt ask 2 euros but maybe inflation is running
>>221639830they also protect the car from themselves and from others though, they wont let africans break your car windows o algo, tell the whole truth
>>221640722sounds like a fucking lie. he'll just take the €5 and move on to his next spot. he wouldn't lift a finger against some african trying to break into the car
>>221640722Hello Calogero
>>221640561I'm southern and first time I ever saw this shit was in Turin, they told me local druggies are into this business. Was quite surprised when people just comply instead of starting to blaspheme on their face
>>221639830>The implied threat is that if you don't pay something might happen to it and sometimes they themselves are the ones who cause damageBased AF Italians are truly the most asshole high testosterone race on earth
>>221640990it depends on the guy, they generally stay in the zone and control it from window breakes of car theft just with their presence, of course if you dont pay they will scratch your car too
>>221641412>of course if you dont pay they will scratch your car tooyeah that is mostly a given from the deranged beavior of an alcoholic/druggie which I assume they are>>221641398imagine living your life like that though. that's failed society tier living
We always went to Spain because Italians are like this
>>221639115>>221639054To be fair, the mafia owns literally everything in southern Italy.
>>221639142Kek
>>221640561Well said/thread>>221639815lol. Lmao. They own all the marinas. If you chartered a sailboat and are cruising the Mediterranean, you're gonna get got by the mafia in southern Italy.
>>221641398>>221641792>>221641901Here comes the mutt with the dumbest takes
>>221639020saw something similar happen to nick fuentes when he was in rome
>>221639020I listened to a podcast recently where someone told this exact same story.
>>221641366Same thing happened to me in another city in northern Italy. The thing is, up there it's always the gypsies or nafris doing this stuff... whereas down south it's the actual locals native southern Italians. It's just over for the souf honestly...>>221642072It's likely they weren't Italian. Btw the most annoying thing for tourists in Rome is the pickpockets on the metro and buses, almost entirely Peruvian gangs and especially Roma from various Balkan countries (fun fact: a large part of Rome is actually controlled by the Casamonica clan even though they're Italian Roma originally from Abruzzo)
>>221639020Tomorrow you'll wake up and your car will be surrounded by the naked corpses of gauls and the hobo will be slumped against it barely alive
You should have spoken broken English loudly and slowly and acted like you don't understand them while walking away. Generally when you're in an area that looks sus you want to make yourself look as unapproachable as possible
>>221639020you did NOT get scammedhe would have pissed all over your door handles if you hadn't paid
>>221642217>it's always the gypsies or nafris doing this stuffNo it was a local druggie>It's just over for the souf honestlyfor retards like you it never even began
>>221641901>lol. Lmao. They own all the marinas. If you chartered a sailboat and are cruising the Mediterranean, you're gonna get got by the mafia in southern ItalyWatch less mobslop movies. There are thousands of people at any given time sailing around the Mediterranean in southern Italy and they don't ''get got'' by the mafia, the perception foreigners (especially Americans) have of southern Italy vs the reality is dumbfounding, most southern Italians won't ever see a mobster in their lives and those people think it's like we meet some kind of Tommy Devito character threatening us everytime we go for a walk
>>221642693True but it's because the mafias learned shitalians are perfectly fine or even conniving with organised crime unless it turns the streets into battlefields like in the 90s
>>221641398>high test society
Nuke the south
>>221639020>>visit Italygrave mistake, you should never visit shitaly under any circumstances
