Quote of the Week...from Jimmy Conway in the movie Goodfellas

You learned the two greatest things in life: never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut.             ---Jimmy Conway (played by Robert Deniro) in the movie Goodfellas

Goodfellas is one of my favorite gangster movies, right up there just behind The Godfather.  In it, young Henry Hill, the narrator character, says that ever since he could remember he always wanted to be a gangster.  Working for a local mafia group, one day he gets arrested, jailed, and appears before a judge...with his boss's lawyer standing at his side.  Released, Henry expects to be rebuked for having been arrested, but instead everyone...including the Head Honcho (played by Paul Sorvino), celebrates and congratulates him: why?  Well, Hill's mentor in organized crime, Conway, explains it in the above line: the young lad didn't rat, and he kept his mouth shut.  Later in the film a grown-up Ray Liotta plays the narrator character...a sterling performance, along with those of Deniro and Joe Pesci.  For me, you don't necessarily have to be in a criminal gang for the above "code" to apply...to partially steal Hill's line, ever since I can remember there have been at least two "societies" with their respective rules: the official one where official authority figures like schoolteachers and police enforce the official rules and laws, and the other societies under the surface that others dominate to circumvent the official society.  To get "in" one needs a connection and an invitation...and once you're in, then you'd better follow their code because they have their own means of enforcement, and it usually doesn't involve due process.  I've never been one to follow either the straight or crooked paths, so with me regarding underground or underworld groups, ignorance is bliss although it's intuitively evident that there's something else underlying the aboveground social order.  I see an analogy in the science fiction Matrix movie series: the Matrix is everywhere: it's where you work, shop, go to church, go to school...even when you pay your taxes.  I believe there are a lot of people who crave that kind of connection and, when they are in a new social setting, quickly set out to find the "cool" people in order to get "in".  But not me: I think I'll just remain an individual and flow with the passing scene...and keep my mouth shut...