BREAKING 'The Greatest of All Time': Muhammad Ali Dead at 74

[ghostsinthemachine]

87. Probably had a bigger effect on racial issues than MLK

My hero. The guy who got people like my Dad into thinking that maybe, just possibly, that black people might be just like everyone else. He also got them thinking that the Viet Nam war was bullshit. Both took some time to do, but they happened.
King and Malcolm X and the Black Panthers and other leaders, or lightning rods, of the civil rights movement were, by the wonder years white people, agitators, uppity nigras but Ali transcended that. He was everywhere and there was no doubting his charm. He was the opposite of what boxers, and especially black boxers,
were supposed to be like. Funny, good looking, witty and without the thuggish attitude of Liston. Not the sad tale that was Floyd Patterson. He was not an animal. He was human.
And that changed everything.

I think Ali did more to advance black people in western civilization than everyone including MLK. At least on a par. And only Bob Marley on a worldwide scale. When Ali visited a country in Africa he was treated as if he were Solomon, or Selassie, and he tried to elevate that country and its people beyond what it was at the time.

For me, the Ali moment I'll never forget was opening ceremony of the Atlanta Olympic games. When he lifted the torch I could feel the strength of the entire world lifting that torch with him. I bawled like a baby. I remember where I was when he beat Liston the first time, in my parents bedroom listening of the radio. When he lost to Frazier in their first match, right after he got reinstated. Frazier knocked him down twice to win the fight and it was like an arrow had been shot into my heart. He regained his mojo though, both in the ring and with his tussles with Howard Cosell (No Cosell and the Ali story would be very different).

Tough, another one of my heroes gone, and one of the last of the universal heroes ever probably. It is impossible to dominate all things today, everything is so fragmented now, so it is unlikely we will ever see the likes of Ali again.

Hell be missed.