Muhammad Ali put on life support as family warned ‘the end is near - **edit Ali has now passed away*

dannyjo22 said:
A legend of the ring that had a horrible end of life I would wish on no one. Never a fan but truly deserves the mantle of legend. I hope he moved on from his racist views in the same way I hope the laughing audience did.
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Considering that he publically and explicitly advocated murdering people for having "inter-racial" relationships and he followed a literal religion of extreme racism (and yes, I do mean "literal"), he had a very long way to move on. Much more than that audience. Much more than almost anyone.
 
Angilion said:
Considering that he publically and explicitly advocated murdering people for having "inter-racial" relationships and he followed a literal religion of extreme racism (and yes, I do mean "literal"), he had a very long way to move on. Much more than that audience. Much more than almost anyone.
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Most people don't know this side of him but hey, Hitler bought his Mum flowers.
I also remember an interview where he was putting down all the white folk who were making money out of him and basically blacks should hang around with blacks and whites hang around with whites etc.

However RIP to a great boxer but a horrible person.
 
RoboCod said:
That's indicative of the times though isn't it?
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The same could be said of any bigotry. Bear in mind that Muhammad Ali was far more racist and violent than, for example, the KKK at the same time, as well as being a religious extremist. Would people be so forgiving of an extremist white supremacist who believed that "whites" were the only real people and called for death for anyone involved in an "inter-racial" relationship and everyone who was involved in any relationship in which either person wasn't a Christian? Even if that person later changed their mind?
 
SexyGreyFox said:
Most people don't know this side of him but hey, Hitler bought his Mum flowers.
I also remember an interview where he was putting down all the white folk who were making money out of him and basically blacks should hang around with blacks and whites hang around with whites etc.

However RIP to a great boxer but a horrible person.
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Not horrible at all. He was angry because of the way black people were treated. Don't forget black people couldn't even use public swimming pools in the US during his lifetime....
 
oulton said:
Not horrible at all. He was angry because of the way black people were treated. Don't forget black people couldn't even use public swimming pools in the US during his lifetime....
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An excuse doesn't make a horrible position less horrible. "They started it!" is a poor reason for being worse than the "they" in question even when you're talking about individuals. When you're talking about "races" (or any other biological group), it's not even close to being acceptable. Would you consider it "not horrible at all" for a white supremacist of the time to have advocated killing "black" people and "justified" their position as a response to Muhammad Ali's racism?

Besides, Muhammad Ali advocated killing "black" people as well if they weren't obedient enough to his demands.

Horrible. Yes. Completely.
 
Angilion said:
An excuse doesn't make a horrible position less horrible. "They started it!" is a poor reason for being worse than the "they" in question even when you're talking about individuals..
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A very blinkered view and completely ignorant of the context. I will be ignoring your silly posts from now on ;)
 
oulton said:
A very blinkered view and completely ignorant of the context. I will be ignoring your silly posts from now on ;)
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Good. It will save me wasting my time trying to explain context to you. Things like, for example, picking one sentence from a post and ignoring the rest of the post which is the...what's the word I'm looking for? Oh yes. The context.
 
Angilion said:
The same could be said of any bigotry. Bear in mind that Muhammad Ali was far more racist and violent than, for example, the KKK at the same time, as well as being a religious extremist. Would people be so forgiving of an extremist white supremacist who believed that "whites" were the only real people and called for death for anyone involved in an "inter-racial" relationship and everyone who was involved in any relationship in which either person wasn't a Christian? Even if that person later changed their mind?
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I agree with everything you say and yes he seemed to be more extreme in his beliefs than most. However, racism seemed quite common in many, if not most. One of my grandads, for example, "never trusted those blacks". There was also my great grandad, who served in WWII, couldn't stand anyone or anything Japanese "they were the worst".

It was all brew out of fear and lack of understanding. Times have changed since. So no, I don't suggest we're forgiving of Ali and his radical views. I just understand" why"
 
I won't even mention the fact that while the likes of Jimi Hendrix were fighting for their country in Vietnam, Ali was in prison for refusing to go.
 
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SexyGreyFox said:
I won't even mention the fact that while the likes of Jimi Hendrix were fighting for their country in Vietnam, Ali was in prison for refusing to go.
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Lacking facts.

Hendrix was enlisted before he was famous, and never saw action (discharged early because he was a crap soldier). He was nowhere near Vietnam and was involved in the protest movement against the war once his fame gave him a platform to push the cause.

Ali took a moral stance which the fullness of time has seen him on the right side of history. Vietnam was a bloody, wasteful, proxy war which was nothing to do with the defence of USA, but a defence of an ideology. Ali's stance was an honourable one, the war was anything but.

On top of that, Ali never went to prison - appealed the sentence and the appeal was upheld. Albeit four years later.
 
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