In Japan, don't be fooled by all those gangsters with Azure Dragons on the left and white tigers on the right, or old oxen tattooed across their chests! They were still a "disadvantaged" group!
Tattoos were merely for intimidating people, distinguishing members, and representing gang culture, much like corporate culture back home. Once someone joined a syndicate, they belonged to it for life! If they wanted to turn back, that was impossible!
In Japan, it was absolutely impossible for someone who had joined a syndicate to become an upstanding citizen again. A tattoo was a symbol of that!
Real syndicates in Japan had to obtain licenses, much like starting a business back home required applying for a business license! Japanese syndicates could only be established after registering with government departments. Otherwise, they were illegal. If the government did not recognize them, they would be shut down!
Therefore, all syndicates currently existing in Japan were legal organizations. They were much like companies, except their operations and methods of business differed!
Only gangs formed by youngsters gathering together, or unemployed people banding together, such as biker gangs, would not be registered or legal.
No matter what Japanese syndicates wanted to do, they first had to avoid disturbing ordinary residents' lives or disrupting public order!
Thus, syndicate activities were actually confined to fixed areas!
Japan's relatively good public security was also due to this sort of management! Since snakes and rats belonged in the same nest, they were kept together. Ordinary citizens, meanwhile, were kept outside!
This was how most of Japanese society was managed.
Moreover, if Japanese syndicates wanted to continue existing, they had to look after residents in nearby areas. Thus, whenever something happened, or there was a disaster, they would appear at the scene before the police arrived!
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