Australian gang signs
“I never had a gang sign and people still knew who were. Then again, I did wear a bucket over my head...”
Like most countries, Australia has groups of people that are classified as "gangs". With this, Australian gang signs are used to identify members of gangs to other members of their gangs, or for two rival gang members to show each other their gangs' sign. These sign off battles would later become the basis for the hobby known as 'shadow puppets'.
The usual gangs[edit]
All Good Mate Gang[edit]
The All Good Mate Gang uses the classic thumbs up as their gang sign. It is near impossible for Police to arrest members of the AGM gang as even non-gang members use thumbs up in their normal, everyday life. Even Police officers use the sign, causing suspicion among the force and opening up many Internal Affairs investigations that go nowhere.
The All Right Gang[edit]
Not to be confused with the Alt-right Gang, the All Right Gang is one of the more nicer gangs that can be found in Australia. During recent years, however, the famous logo and gang sign for the All Right Gang has been tarnished by Americans with the BLM riots in the United States in which the Aussie All Right Gang sign, an okay hand gesture, has been used to mean 'white power'.
Industry SuperGang[edit]
The Industry SuperGang has one of the most well known gang signs in Australian history. The sign can be formed by cupping both hands and placing them above and below each other. Members of this gang are both male and female, can range between the ages of four and eighty, and are often trying to look for someone to fund them.
The Finger Gang[edit]
Unlike the All Right Gang, the Finger Gang, also known as the Rude Gang, is (like its name) one of the ruder gangs in Australia. Its members are known to often give passerbys the 'middle finger' in shopping centres and at parks during lunch time.
A subsidiary of the Finger Gang is the Pinky Club. Pinky gang members wrote the song "This Little Piggy". Instead of giving members of the public the 'rude finger', however, Pinky Club members can be identified when they show each other their pinky fingers (the small one) when they enter their gang hideouts and lairs.
Punishment[edit]
After being flipped off by a Finger Gangmember when giving a speech in 2014, current Prime Minister at the time, Tony Abbott, introduced a new bill into Parliament that would punish any person caught using a gang sign in public. At first, the punishment was only a $200 fine, but after more and more members of the government were made victims of being on the receiving end of a 'bird', the new law would make the gang member's hand that was used to produce and make the hand gesture be removed, or in layman's terms; their hand will be chopped off.
Gang members who had their hands cut off were seen as "no-handed" by their gangs, and were kicked out and left to fend for themselves. In 2016, there were 128 ex-gang members who were now handless, all of which had banded together to create their own new gang, in which they would use their feet to show off and make the gang sign. After the police raided the Feet Gang HQ, the gang was disbanded with many of the now ex-ex-gang members turning to OnlyFans to sell feet pics or some getting jobs at shoe companies to test out new shoes. A problem that police had while executing the raid on the Feet Gang was that their handcuffs were now useless. To combat this problem, officers cuffed the feet and dragged them out of the building. Another problem with the raid was that the Judge had initially signed off a search warrant for the Fett Gang. Luckily, he saw his mistake quickly and fixed it.
Modern gang signs[edit]
Since most people who are in a gang are now too scared to use a hand sign to show their allegiance, some have resorted to making signs for their gangs. Hidden in plain sight at places like roundabouts and on bridges, these new modern gang signs can direct people to where they can find the meeting location of gangs in their area.
Because of this, many gang hangouts have been found and raided by police in recent years, with many of the gang leaders confused about how their super secret bases were located. According to police, most of these gang hangouts were found by chance after taking the wrong turn on the Sydney motorway, or going down a street marked "Finger Gang Base This Way -->" thinking it was a one-way street.
