In mobs/mafias, do lower-level guys ever do menial jobs around the bars/clubs?

Made is only really a thing in the actual mafia

In the crips and bloods etc it’s referred to as being an OG ( original Gangsta)

some other crews call it being Down or Solid language varies a lot from crew to crew

that aside the chances are that an ordinary soldier is not going to be made ( etc) that tends to be reserved for people who’ve done a serious service and earned their place ( among other things being made means you can’t be killed without the say so of the boss and if you are the family will go to war over it so it’s not something they do lightly)

on point it would be unlikely a made guy would work in a Joe job but he could certainly own a bar and work behind it because he likes it

also a crime crew doesn’t need someone to procure illegal drugs because they have their own dealers and line of supply from which they can get them ( it’s also notable that some crews say that their made guys have to be clean because drug use causes poor judgment- again this varies from crew to crew)

 

In the US mob the "soldiers" are the lowest rank of made guys. They usually slot into two categories, earners and enforcers. As to which talent earned them membership, both are self explanatory.

Guys who aren't made for any number of reasons are known as "associates," with many being more valuable to the bosses than the actual made guys who are on the stupider side (a "mameluke" in local slang).

Either way, the made guys in my area--what's left of them--including the capos, spend most of their days sitting around cafes, bars, and strip clubs, playing cards and scratching their balls. So, yeah, you can have them do anything and it'll be believable, but they're not going to be scrubbing toilets or doing anything menial unless they want to, like Moose said.

 

It’s funny how language varies

Round here aside from a couple of 1% bike groups most of the organised crime is Albanian . They use soldier for the expendable peons who aren’t ‘made’ ( the term they use actually translates as solid) . An associate is someone outside the group who generally isn’t a criminal but with whom they do ancillary business like the guy who provides them with cars

meanwhile the bikers use associate to mean someone who’s a friend of the club but who doesn’t ride. Their cannon fodder are prospects or hang around while being made is called full patch … as in being allowed to wear the club patch and rockers

for a bunch of animated cats it doesn’t matter all that much although you could have fun with terms more suited to the fact that they’re cats

Maybe being made is called uncollared or someone who’s a total psycho is known as a nip head ( as in catnip)

or maybe guys who do jobs for the crew get their ears marked with a claw and three notches and you’re made as a ‘full notch’

 

Honestly, I have no clue. Italian America slang varies greatly by region, both in terms of where it's spoken in the US and from what region of Italy it likely evolved from in the first place. You will hear different versions of it in Providence (where I'm from), New Jersey, and several different ones in New York. Brooklyn slang is different from Staten Island slang. Or at least it used to be. I'd imagine the Internet has cancelled some of that out, whereas you used to only learn what you heard directly.

The slave part makes sense, though. A person of lower status and intelligence, which would have been prevalent during the Moorish occupation of Sicily.

Mameluke isn't mafia specific, though. That's just a loose term Italian American term for a dumbass. "Chooch," "Jabroni, " and "Bobo" are common, too. Jabroni is probably the most common and my personal go-to.

 

I think it’s to do with the napoleonic wars. The French used mamuluk mercenaries in the occupation of Italy and they had very flamboyant uniforms which were the object of derision by the Italians

from there mamaluke came to be a slang term for a man who looks foolish