America’s Most Courageous Fighter
The audacity with which the beloved Cassius Clay transformed himself into Muhammad Ali, unmasking the hypocrisy of America’s racist culture and hegemonic foreign policy, is hard to fully comprehend even today.
Muhammad Ali’s moniker as The Greatest extends far beyond the boxing ring. He was one of America’s most noble public figures — a larger than life mythic presence thrust into the global consciousness by sheer force of personality and moral courage. He rose to prominence in a time of cultural tumult and transformation, which he fearlessly confronted in both his professional and personal life. His fighting style as well as his social provocations were expressed in paradox. He was raw power, black power, brute force, and brash confidence while simultaneously exuding a lightness of grace, an inclusive sensitivity, and a joyful sense of play. His poetry and humor embodied the wisdom of the elders and the whimsy of childhood. Heroic in every sense of the word, he was a world champion athlete, a warrior for social justice, and a man fighting for dignity and perseverance against a wretched illness, Parkinson’s disease, that finally took his life at the age of 74.
I was just a child when Ali was at his apex of fame and celebrity. Even then, however, the mesmerizing spectacle of his outsized character lodged itself into my consciousness. It would be years before I could comprehend the profundity of his life and how he used his celebrity as a tool to challenge the insidious and explicit brutality of a deeply unjust society falling so short of its aspirational rhetoric. His radical social valor expressed with infectious charm and brutal honesty was disorienting to watch, especially as a white kid growing up in the suburban south of the 70s and 80s. He was an icon of traditional, even stereotypical, masculinity who earned his acclaim in a sport unapologetically devoted to glorifying violence. That a man renowned the world over for his ability to physically beat other humans to submission would refuse to participate in the savagery of an unjust Vietnam war only spoke to the contradictions already mentioned.
His was a brazen intelligence, unique in American popular culture. The audacity with which the beloved Cassius Clay transformed himself into Muhammad Ali, unmasking the hypocrisy of America’s racist culture and hegemonic foreign policy, is hard to fully comprehend even today. What contemporary celebrities of any discipline express a similar righteousness with such a keen intellect at such great personal risk? Even more impressive was the manner in which Ali seemed to transcend the justifiable rage and anger of America’s violent racism and bigotry. It appeared that the clarity of his conscience allowed him an ease, peacefulness, and poise at the same time he was expressing the harshest truths with a bold ferocity.
Muhammad Ali makes me proud of this country in such a complicated way. Though his outspoken politics inspired outrage in much of conservative America, the man’s disarming spirit was hard to resist. Despite the fact that he earned his fame beating the hell out of people and aggressively defying social and political norms, there was an undeniable kindness, sensitivity, and warmth that I think even his critics recognized. In the same way his rope-a-dope strategy was genius in using the superior muscle and strength of his opponent George Foreman against himself, Ali’s appeals to love and spiritual resilience eventually fatigued the forces of discrimination and hate that disdained him. History has consistently looked more and more favorably on The Champ, and his spirit’s legacy will only grow even as his mortal body lies defeated.
