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Life's Pleasures Quote by Al Capone

"Now I know why tigers eat their young"

About this Quote

It lands like a punchline with blood on it: a mob boss reaching for the natural world to justify an ugly human impulse. Capone’s line is a dark little fable. He’s not admiring tigers; he’s admiring the logic of annihilating vulnerability before it becomes liability. In the jungle version, “eating their young” is a mythologized shorthand for ruthless survival. In Capone’s mouth, it becomes an alibi for paranoia and control.

The intent reads as emotional venting dressed up as wisdom. It’s the kind of sentence you throw out when disgust, betrayal, or exhaustion has finally curdled into something colder: contempt for dependence itself. The subtext is that innocence is not sacred; it’s dangerous. “Young” isn’t literally children so much as anyone who’s under your wing, anyone who can disappoint you, implicate you, or grow into a threat. The line carries a gangster’s inversion of the family story: the paternal role isn’t protection, it’s risk management.

Context matters because Capone lived inside systems built on loyalty while expecting disloyalty. Organized crime runs on “family” language while practicing transactional violence; the sentiment exposes that contradiction. It’s also a performance of hardness. To admit you’re hurt is weak; to cloak it in animal instinct is to sound inevitable, almost scientific. That’s why it works: it turns personal bitterness into a law of nature, letting the speaker feel not just angry, but right.

Quote Details

TopicDark Humor
SourceHelp us find the source
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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Capone, Al. (2026, January 14). Now I know why tigers eat their young. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/now-i-know-why-tigers-eat-their-young-140098/

Chicago Style
Capone, Al. "Now I know why tigers eat their young." FixQuotes. January 14, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/now-i-know-why-tigers-eat-their-young-140098/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Now I know why tigers eat their young." FixQuotes, 14 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/now-i-know-why-tigers-eat-their-young-140098/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.

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Now I Know Why Tigers Eat Their Young - Al Capone Quote
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About the Author

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Al Capone (January 17, 1899 - February 25, 1947) was a Criminal from USA.

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