He Stung Like A Bee

Thanks to Covid-19, I’ve been consuming lots of Netflix moments. One of my most recent was to watch Ali, the 2001 film that depicts the life of boxing legend Muhammad Ali. This is perked my interest in boxing and the story of the man himself.

I could not have found a better time to get interested in the life of Muhammad Ali. Like most people, I’ve been glued to the TV, watching images of protest and riots caused by the murder of George Floyd, the black man, murdered by a white policeman. The Western world is going through a lot of angst about racism and police brutality. I’ve argued in a previous blog posting that Singapore, which, while geographically in Southeast Asia, has the same underlying problems that the Western World in terms of race relations, particularly with a dark-skinned underclass.

However, if you look at the life of Muhammad Ali, you’d find that there is a glimmer of hope. While his boxing achievements are well known, there are small, lesser well-known anecdotes from his life, which should inspire hope. What I found most interesting, came from the eulogy given by his fourth wife, Mrs. Lonnie Ali, where she told the story of how he got started in boxing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fpiQJH8daA

Muhammad Ali or Cassius Clay as he was known before then, grew up in Louisville, Kentucky in the 1960s. This was during “segregation,” a period of American history that was pretty similar to apartheid in South Africa. Government policy was designed to keep black people poor and while slavery had been officially been abolished a century or so ago, the laws were designed to keep the black population down. Kentucky was one of the places where segregation was not just law but culture.

So, when you look at this era of American history, in which he grew up, the first great sign of hope was the fact that the man who got him into boxing was a white policeman called Joe Marten. Mr. Martin, who had a sideline as a boxing coach. As Mrs. Ali said the funeral, “Something is going on when a cop from the South gets along with an inner-city black kid.”

The main point here is that goodness is possible in culture that is racist and small acts of kindness can make a bigger difference than brute force. The comparison that comes to mind is the American military campaign in Vietnam, which involved lots of bombing and the British campaign against the Malayan Communist, which involved a hearts and minds campaign. Superior force only united the local population against the Americans. The hearts and minds campaign brought the locals onto the side of the British. In the current situation, the cities that have managed the riots best are places where the cops put down their batons and hugged the protesters. The places where the situation that got inflamed were places where the cops treated the protesters like they were part of the battlefield.

The next point from the life of Muhammad Ali was the fact that he was associated with the Nation of Islam, an organization that is effectively promoted black supremacy (the other extreme). His first political mentor was Malcolm X and in between Cassius Clay and Muhammad Ali, he was Cassius X.

As he grew in his boxing career, the man known as Muhammad Ali was particularly sensitive about his name. As far as he was concerned, his name was “Muhammad Ali,” and “Cassius Clay” was his “slave name,” which was thrust upon him by white slave owners (the original Cassius Marcellus Clay was a 19^th Century Republican Abolitionist). One of the most vicious beatings he gave anyone in the ring was to an opponent who called him “Cassius Clay.” Legend has it that with each beating he gave, he’d yell “say my name.”

Eventually, like his political mentor, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali moved away from the Nation of Islam’s more extremist ideology, towards mainstream Islam. He embraced people of all colours and faiths and was loved for it. There is a scene in the movie Ali, when his second wife tells him “Those brothers Xs and Ys are only there when you’re the champ and no longer there now you have no use to them.”

What does that say? I believe that this point of Muhammad Ali’s life shows us that going to the opposite extreme is not the answer. Extremist groups are only interested in themselves and you gain so much more when you cross lines of race and religion. At Muhammad Ali’s funeral, there was a point that religious leaders from all faiths would be present and acknowledged.

Muhammad Ali was not a saint. He was a philanderer (four wives and nine kids) and his “trash talking” which promoted fights did hurt. His rival, Joe Frazier, who had helped him out financially in the period where he was not allowed to box because of his opposition to the Vietnam War, grew very bitter towards him because Ali did insult him (called him a gorilla – didn’t help that Ali by contrast was very good looking in his youth).

However, he was a man of great courage, who overcame the circumstances of his birth and rose above the racism of his era. He gave back to the world. In an age where brutality towards the underclass and racist undertones are encouraged at an official level, his life story should inspire us to make a world of what it should be instead of what it is.