Even the Italian mob has started flying the rainbow flag.
A star prosecutor in Italy has revealed the mafia is now open to gay men — and even has a drag queen in their midst.
“The mafia have evolved along with society,” Nicola Gratteri, an anti-mafia investigator in Calabria, told the Times of London. “Gays can be accepted now, even as foot soldiers, so long as they don’t parade it in public.”
The inspector claims to have intercepted “passionate” letters between a crime boss and a young lieutenant, and has eavesdropped on phone conversations revealing many mafia foot soldiers enjoy transvestite bars. The scion of one crime family is living as a drag queen under the name “Lady Godiva,” the prosecutor found.
Previously, mobsters risked being murdered if they were even suspected of being gay.
Homosexuality is still taboo among older bosses.
“It undermines their image of themselves as tough, virile guys,” Gratteri said of the previously homophobic underworld.
In 1992, New Jersey mob boss John “Johnny Boy” D’Amato, head of the DeCavalcante family, was shot dead by one of his own soldiers after it emerged he was homosexual.