Boxing great Muhammad Ali died
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The Greatest with The Greatest
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When I heard the news early this morning I was deeply saddened! At least Muhammad can now joke with John and George in the Boxing ring in the sky.
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Some thoughts I just shared with my work colleagues -- If you didn't live through the '60s and '70s, I'm not sure if you can quite imagine how monumental a figure Muhammad Ali was -- as an athlete, as a social and political figure, and as a cultural icon. It's not an exaggeration to say he was like the sun -- his energy just permeated the world and you couldn't help feeling like that radiant source of heat and like would always be around. Hearing that he'd died is like looking up and seeing a vast, empty void where the sun ought to be. I really don't think there's anyone in any field right now who feels like such a global force. I don't much like boxing, but to say he was a great boxer doesn't even start to explain it. In his hands, the sport was something totally different than it had ever been, but that was just the beginning. Imagine someone with the athletic skills of, say, a Steph Curry, but forced out of competition in his prime (we'll get to that part in a minute) for three whole years. And then, imagine him coming back, realizing that age had dimmed the speed and agility that made him a star, and learning a whole new set of skills and tactics to become a champion again. Twice. That alone would be enough to make Ali remarkable. He willingly sacrificed his career to refuse to be drafted into the Vietnam war, having no idea that he would ever be vindicated or able to come back. Some called him a coward or a draft-dodger. Bull. He was a conscientious objector -- a designation that no one would have questioned had he been white and Quaker rather than black and Muslim. And he minced no words about his reasons. Remember that the war was still generally supported by the public when Ali dared to say, "No Viet Cong ever called me 'nigger.'" It's easy to forget now, amid all the warm and fuzzy remembrances, how much hate was heaped on this man for daring to hold to his convictions. And if you doubt how rare that level of courage is, just look at Paul Ryan and all the other Republicans who really do know better groveling at the feet of Donald Trump. One final note. There's been some commentary from (possibly) well-meaning idiots claiming Ali "transcended race" -- I'm attaching one example I picked up from Twitter. There's a simple answer to this: No. NO. He didn't transcend race (oh, and when do you ever hear that a white person "transcended race"?), he embraced and celebrated his blackness. His message to white America -- which much of white America did not want to hear -- was: I'm black and I'm Muslim and I'm not only as good as any of you, I'm better than most of you. And he was right.
