FourLoko slipped into a shadowy corner. She had just knocked over a convenience store and thought she had gotten away clean, but now, a few blocks away she felt like she was being followed. It was nothing she could confirm, just a feeling in the pit of her stomach that crawled its way up into her mind and made a nice little spot for itself. Sure, Four was a bit loko, crazy in the head, but this was real or at least as real as she was believing. 

She peaked around the corner, but made sure she didn’t take herself out of the shadows away from the street lights. The sidewalk was empty from the way she had come. Four looked up street, even there, it was empty. She felt a new wave of something go through her body as goosebumps covered her arms. Maybe it was a to be a full moon tomorrow and tonight was just an eerie night. Four scolded herself for being so paranoid. There wasn’t anything there, absolutely nothing. 

That night, Four tossed and turned and when morning came, she wasn’t able to sleep in as she usually did. Her restlessness pushed her out of her apartment after a quick cup of coffee. She took a jog around town to hopefully work her thoughts off, but she had been inspired from last nights events, or lack of. Four found a street corner that was common place to put out an old soap box and share your thoughts. She skipped the soap box, a tradition that seemed to be left behind long ago and spoke. 

Last night I found myself in a bit of trouble. I’m sure that isn’t surprising to some of you. Thankfully all that trouble was made up in my head. 

Four sighs with a smile.

After I had finished up a crime I felt like someone was following me. Thankfully, or maybe not thankfully, no one was. I guess it’s all in how one would look at it. I felt like a fool to be so worked up when no one was actually following me. I couldn't imagine wasting my life worrying about things that may never happen. To be so rife with paranoia that nothing else matters but safe guarding what is mine. Paranoia can be argued to be unproductive, but what if it's not?

I then began to reflect my own experience onto the history of our world. There have been plenty of times, if not the majority of the time, where wars have started because of paranoia. Let it be paranoia for a city to attack another or just the simple feeling that one city is getting too strong over another. 

On the other hand, paranoia can just be a figment of the imagination. Maybe there isn’t such a thing as paranoia, bad things happen to good people. Someone is watching, always. Everything that can happen inevitably will happen in it’s own time. 

Which one is the way to go? Push the paranoia away as the poisonous over thinking that it is or to embrace it as the horrible truth? Do you flip out and stab the mailman or do you take your pills and count to ten? Do we hope for the best, but expect the worst? Or do we become the paranoid man who is always preparing for the shit to hit the fan, but spends his entire life preparing for it?

So, Paranoia. Good or bad?

Kal_El stood there and listened to FourLoko. And when all was said, he stepped up. The crowd stared at him as he stood in the spot FourLoko once stood. They ooo'd, they ahhh'd, but it wasn't even like he opened his mouth to say anything yet. The reactions from the crowd was simply off of his insanely handsome looks. The world has yet to see any male this good looking. Kal_El glowed as if he was Jesus. No, in fact, he glowed as if God himself opened the clouds and announced to the world that Kal_El was his son. The ladies in the crowd threw panties at him, and at one point, FourLoko was spotted behind Kal_El staring at him and biting her lips.

Throat clearing noises.

"Paranoia. Good or bad? Well, it depends on one thing. How paranoid are you? In some cases being too paranoid can fuck everything up. You start to look at every single detail, looking over your shoulders too much, thinking too hard, and in some cases you even try to make the best better. But thats where people fuck up. How can one make the best better? Then in some cases people aren't paranoid enough. They don't see the small things, they never look over their shoulder, they don't think they just do. BAM! Next to Bubba they are. So it can vary. I was always told better safe than sorry. I do know one thing for sure. Being paranoid while tripping might be the worst thing ever..."

And with that said he stepped away from the speaker's spot and awaited whoever was next.

Good day ladies and gentlemen!

a deep voice came from the back

My name is Ghostdog, and I am pleased to meet you Mrs. FourLoko. I have heard so many good words about you from my father, Mythos. You have been a good friend to him.

As for paranoia, i would like to express my humble opinion.

One day as i have chosen to rest myself in a coffee shop, i heard two young men discussing. They didn't look like mafioso, but yet they were talking about stories that they heard from mafiosos from the past. They spoke about people who one minute they killed a man with their hands and next minute, the same hands were holding the killers son, with love. How they could just wash away all the blood from their hands and use them to make love to their wives later. They thought that the man who does this is insane. They laughed when they were talking about protections that people had to take in order to protect themselves. They claimed mafioso are overreacting when it comes to protection. It seemed to them so crazy when someone had to put his hand in front of his mouth so noone could read his lips.

At first I thought that those two young men were just ignorant. I drunk my coffee and I left. Not more than a week or two after this i read in the papers "two gangsters killed in bank robbery" In the second page, the faces of those two young men from the coffee shop. I wish I could go back in time and explain them, nothing is paranoia. This is the way to survive.

Ghostdog bowed his head towards Mrs. FourLoko and slowly made his steps back.

Have a nice day!

Paranoia is a beguiling call to death, and many fall prey to the sweet pitch of its siren. Many believe our crime syndicates are founded on honor, respect, or trust in your colleagues, but this is incorrect. At its core, our world is strung together by a mutual desire to survive. It's often referred to as "realism," but when one takes a step into the realm of paranoia, they often drift into Machiavellian beatitudes. When that drift occurs, people die. This is nothing you haven't seen or heard before.

What is interesting, however, is paranoia's prevalence. In times like these, where a single group of leaders form a hegemonic monopoly on power, the case for paranoia is underwhelming. No one at the top has any reason to fear for their lives, or the lives of those they employ. Any little peeps about mistrust, disloyalty, or scheming are met with quick ends (i.e. Buscetta and Co.). As long as each of the district leaders stay vigilant about maintaining their monopoly on power, they never need to fear strikes from their equals.

Because paranoia has no place in the current state of our world, I'll make some predictions. When certain conditions are met, paranoia can form cracks in even the most sturdy alliance. Conditions in which paranoia prospers include bodyguard stealth wacking and rogue assailants; but it can also occur when the top echelon is inflated. Eventually, more and more men and women will make their way to the top ranks of our world. They train their guns, and each of those guns is another person you have to trust. Eventually, you have to trust a lot of people (including people you don't know) not to shoot you.

At present, even a Don CL's "plots" are of little threat to our world's stability. Therefore, anyone who is paranoid at this point is someone severely lacking in reason. However, all it takes is a little bit of time and tension, and suddenly everyone or anyone can be a rival.

Ah well, paranoia is a funny thing. And different people have different opinions of it. Today, I guess I’ll give my own:

If you’re not paranoid about something in the slightest here, you’re generally not doing it right. This world is a dangerous one. We know the profession that we’re in. So if you’re just a member doing little crimes, okay. What do you have to be paranoid about? Well, you can be paranoid for your crewleader I suppose, but really that’s his job. Crewleaders should be paranoid. Godfathers should be paranoid. Hands should be paranoid. But what is paranoia? Paranoia means that you’re thinking about the future. And, let’s be honest… Everyone’s future does have a stopping point. Do you want to die today? No… Tomorrow? No… In month? Maybe… A year? I’d hope so… But in the now, you don’t want to die, or you shouldn’t want to die… So paranoia… is thinking about survival and the potential for the fact that you may not survive something… in short.

So if you’re a leader, you should be thinking: Who are my enemies? Who are my friends? That’s a question that I doubt anyone can give a perfect answer on, and thus that’s where paranoia can stem, but I don’t see that as a bad thing. The concept of knowing your enemy is different from finding your enemy. Finding your enemy can involve the process of making one, but knowing him or her means that it has already been a standing issue.

So, it’s important for a leader to ask those questions. However, this is where it gets tricky, and this is why there is a negative connotation to the word “paranoia” in this world, that there shouldn’t be. If you hit a point where you can’t answer those questions at all, especially the first one about who your enemy is, you might start creating delusions of who your enemy could be. This is when it gets dangerous. This is when people lose sleep, and most importantly, this is when people die, needlessly. It is a position that everyone in power has found themselves in, if they were working properly, and the people who are able to move past the delusions are the ones that tend not to make mistakes that could harm them, and people they could potentially work with in the future.

Another negative connotation with paranoia exists here due to the fact that it is a tool of causing war, and many people use it. I find these people disgusting, but people do spread misinformation, especially when they have recently dead parents or outstanding issues. And most leaders know to ignore a lot of this stuff they get told, but some people do fall for it, and that’s one of the saddest things to see here. Leaders should not be played by these small people. They should not be able to get in a leaders ear and influence them, because they have an outside agenda. Sometimes it isn’t completely apparent, but that’s why when you’re given intel, you need to confirm it. It can’t just be hearsay.

So, paranoia isn’t a perfect science, but it is something that should be in a leader and in us all in some way inherently, because if we aren’t listening or watching for what’s around the corner, we might just walk into something oblivious and well we won’t be walking out. The only way to ensure survival is by knowing what the dangers are and combating them. But don’t let paranoia rule you and take control, but let it be there on your shoulder whispering because sometimes your senses are correct, and perhaps you can avoid hitting the other end of the sword. 

I do believe there is a difference between being aware of your surroundings and being paranoid of them. Being aware of those who may not like you or those who are too close for comfort is a much healthier than being paranoid. I believe that if you are aware, but that awareness keeps pushing itself further and further and then all of a sudden you’re obsessed with it and paranoid you won’t be able to think as clearly as you could if you were just aware of the situation. BloodySpikeS, I agree with you, that answering those two questions are easy. Who are my enemies? Who are my friends? Sometimes it’s blatantly obvious, other times friends walk about as a wolf in sheep’s clothing. I will have to disagree with you that not being able to answer those questions clearly is where paranoia stems from.

If a Godfather, a crew leader or even plain old joy on the street is aware that not everyone will like them and tension may develop between people or groups, but is still confident in what they are doing and the choices there will be less of a chance of paranoia creeping in. Denam brought up the current state of our world and how paranoia has no place in it. I agree with him. With that being said, I don’t think Crew leaders and Godfathers should be paranoid. They shouldn’t walk around with their eyes closed, but open and watching, but not paranoid. Thinks could shift at any time. I’d like to think that the majority of the people in our line of work do not want to die tomorrow, but there is always a chance. 

Yes, BloodySpikeS, people do spread misinformation. 

When they spread it into ears of those willing, they can use paranoia as a tool to their advantage. In these situations I like to picture paranoia playing out, like you said, as a whisper. A disgruntled son who just lost his father and looking for revenge may try to influence someone with the power to avenge his fathers death. A whisper here, a thought there. It is unfortunate when people act on these whispers without looking into it and seeing if the facts are facts or just lies. Though, how can you actually tell. It’s almost like the questions: Who are my enemies? Who are my friends?. It’s not so easy to answer or to find an answer. 

It’s easy to stand out here and say crew leaders know to ignore those opinions, but what if those opinions come from your members. Are they just suppose to ignore their members? I hope not. Finding the balance between taking everyone’s opinion with a grain of salt and listening and doing something with each opinion that comes in is easier said than done. Finding that balance is also different for each individual person. Crew leaders are human and they make mistakes just like everyone else. Sometimes those mistakes are small and sometimes large, like a war brought on by unconfirmed rumors. 

you are not paranoid! THEY ARE REALLY WATCHING US AND CONTROLLING EVERYTHING!!!

Curtis listened to the discussion and thought about what the various speakers had to say before joining in.

"I think this is always going to be an interesting subject because of the nature of our business. Paranoia is an inevitability at some stage or another.

I'm glad FourLoko clarified the definition of paranoia as it's an important line to draw. Its essential for any leader to be aware of their surroundings and mindful of all the families and potential angles that exist. That is just sensible and doesn't have to govern their thinking or decision making to any irrational extent. It is only when they become preoccupied with a certain perceived threat and let that preoccupation begin to govern their thinking, that the rot sets in. 

Paranoia is an insidious destabilizing  infection that left unchecked grows with increasing rapidity and almost inevitable leads to warped and often fatal decisions. It is half the skill of leadership to keep a balanced head and see things clearly. Not allowing the opinions of others unbalance you can be very difficult if the general consensus seems to weigh in favor of the paranoid perception.

There will always be voices attempting to stir up conflict and add weight to any doubt. This is the nature of our society and half the skill of balanced leadership. Keeping all these things in order is no small task."

Taking  a nip from his silver hip flask, he concluded.

"Eventually, over a long enough time, everything comes to a head. This could take months, it could take years but sooner or later, sure enough the pressure builds. Opposing forces grow increasingly reserved toward one another or collective outside pressure grows to such an extent that perceptions and trust begins to warp. At that tipping point, the clock starts ticking toward inevitable end.

Our society is cyclical and this is just a fundamental part of the great cycle. Some would say a necessary one too."