Real Meaning of Mentsh, Omertà

I noticed that Wikipedia has a misleading discussion of omertà

You can put all sorts of sinister connotations on the word, but -tà in this word is an abstract ending equivalent to -(i)ty in English or -(i)tas in Latin, and it is added to a verbal form that means "being a man."

I grew up with the Sicilian language (as well as Yiddish, Polish, English, and to some extent Spanish). Omertà meaning manliness can certainly be used outside of criminal contexts.

(While it makes sense that the head of a criminal gang would expect umirtà [humility] and respect from the members of his gang, I have to admit that I had never read or heard the alternate proposed derivation of omertà from humilitas [Latin humility] and have never heard omertà used in an expression that would make such an etymology plausible.)

At the root, if you have omertà, you are not a snitch and not a cry-baby. In truth the phrase za a mentsh in real Yiddish (not Yinglish) is exactly telling someone to have some omertà despite the ignorance of Harvard Yiddish Studies Professor Ruth Wisse, whose academic position at Harvard shows the power of corrupt Jewish social networking and the Yiddish code of silence.

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