Muhammad Ali is the Father of Boxing

Burt I always respect your opinions, but you are well off base here. And please don't bother trying to play the age card. You ask the majority of people about the importance of the Vietnam War compared to WW2, and it won't be even close. Like I said, I ABSOLUTELY RESPECT WW2 vets, and I DO respect Vietnam vets, and all vets (even if I don't always believe in the cause behind certain conflicts).

When did I say people should be able to pick and choose which laws they chose to obey?? Again. you're putting into my mouth, words I never said.

Also when did I ever say Ali was my idol?? I never did. He isn't. And I also said Ali did do a lot of bad things, and him joining the Nation of Islam, and speaking at KKK rallies was abhorrent.

Seems like most Americans who just blindly support every single war America gets into in the name of patriotism are the real gullible people here. Unfortunately it's not just the US, it's every country which suffers from this problem, though it's definitely more pronounced in the US, and they love to be the world's police. A mistake that luckily Britain is starting to learn from.

And there's no point trying to bring up British politics, I, like the majority of people in this country, think our political system is insanely flawed, and is full of problems. The only difference is that we can admit it.

And as for Winston Churchill, little known fact- he ordered the slaughter of innocent women and children,ordered the gunning down of Iraqi protesters, and advocated dropping mus**** gas on entire villages in Iraq to quell the uprising against British Imperialism. He also changed the allied bombing strategy in WW2 to refocus on German cities in 1940 (worst case, see the bombing of Dresden), resulting in Hitler bombing civilian centres as opposed to purely military and manufacturing sites - i.e he pushed for the carpet bombing strategy the UK used during WW2. His justification was that it would break the will of the German People. I guess someone forgot to tell him that the Germans were living under a Fascist Dictatorship and had no control over their situation. Not to mention he held closet bigoted views akin to white supremacy, which should come as no surprise seeing as he was born in 1874, when British Imperialism was still rife.

Case in point, when he casually diverted the supplies of medical aid and food that was being dispatched to the starving victims in Bengal, India to the already well supplied soldiers of Europe. When about that he said, “I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits..” The Delhi Government sent a telegram painting to him a picture of the horrible devastation and the number of people who had died. His only response was, “Then why hasn’t Gandhi died yet?” (and I don't care for Ghandi either, he was a rotten person too)

But anyway this is a boxing forum like you said in another post, no place for political arguments. I'm out. Cheers.

 

Burt + Superman....For what it's worth i enjoyed reading both your posts/although from opposite viewpoints i thought they both had merits that had me nodding approval. It just shows how opposing views can be understood when well written !
Ps... When you actually read the question put forward by the O.P The answer has to be.. NO.
Ali was alot of things but don't see him as the 'Father of boxing' ! Not really sure what that would actually mean/or look like ?

 

The Court did not decide that Ali had not broken the law.
It's judgement was not based on that.
Had it done so, Ali would have stood convicted and gone to jail.
The court was evenly divided on Ali's guilt. A tie vote would have allowed the conviction to stand. Courts do not like tie votes. It makes them appear to be indecisive.
Instead, the court sought common ground by agreeing his appeal had been mishandled by the government. This was a technicality, but it was the basis of the final decision.

 

Ok, M, America is bad, Winston Churchill was a warmonger, Ali was slightly misguided, and I am stupid for loving this country
because it "tried" to ward off the spread of communism...In this
messy, complicated world that we are born into, every democratic country tries to protect itself as best as it can, LEARNING the mistakes of the past when Hitler could of been stopped, Chamberlain's and Western Europe appeasment
allowed this tyrant to get stronger and WW2 oncurred. Today we know the lesson we have to stop evil in the bud,as BEST we can...So M, we differ as today's political correct left wing
educators spout "BLAME AMERICA" for their past transgressions
whilst they bask in their safe homes aid for by so many men of my generation who heroically served this country . To criticize
a giant such as Winston Churchill who helped save Europe in it's darkest days makes me mad as hell. So M Ali is your paragon of virtue, America is a warmonging nation, and on and on ...
I know which side you are on. Blame America is the damn left's
motto today, and God help us today...

 

Isn't it Jack Broughton's official title?

Ali may be the biggest cultural phenomenon in boxing.

 

Amen !

It's not every day you come across such an insightful and considered post from one who doesn't lap up the coolade, whatever the era.

No sir, not since OP graced this forum.

Truly, he's part of the "greatest Generation" whose remnants put to shame, those of you who had the misfortune to be hatched after it was all over.

As Bill Shakespeare might have put it...

And gentlemen in America now abed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not there,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us to thwart the reds, the yellow peril.

God Bless America !

 

With all due respect there is absolutely NO COMPARISON between WW 2, in which Hitler was determined to exterminate every Jewish person living in Europe and Russia, and occupying and controlling those countries also. And Vietnam.

Both of my parents were in the services in the second world war RAF, and WAF, plus we had other family members that were Green beret's ( later to be named the Royal Marine Commando's ) plus some that unfortunately were captured and held POW's by the Japanese. These people also knew guys that had been involved in the sickening aftermath of the Germans fleeing the death camps. Nothing comes close to the Nazi's intentions of WW2, not even the horrific WW1 in which millions of uniformed soldiers on both sides were killed ( huge respect to each and every one of them ) but it was battlefield warfare. Not the willful extermination of a people like WW2.

America's paranoid perception of communism in south east asia spreading all over the world, was simply that, paranoia.

 

Nothing apart from Stalins or Mao's regimes.....

 

Vietnam was a civil war in some tiny obscure country that most Americans never knew existed at that time. It wasn't as if China or Russia were trying to impose communist takeover on Canada or Mexico.. Had John F. Kennedy lived through the 60's he more than likely would have pulled the U.S out of Vietnam. Sadly it was Johnson calling the shots. My heart goes out to anyone who's father's, brothers, husbands, sons, etc were killed or severely maimed in that conflict ( never declared a war because Johnson kept lying to the country. ) World war II was an entirely different situation. An entire continent had already been conquered.. An entire race was being exterminated. You had not one but at least three dictators in Europe who were looking to conquer other shores. Not the same thing as two halfs of a fly spec on the map fighting over a piece of jungle.

 

What's your motto ? "NEVER BLAME AMERICA" ?

:good

 

And let's not revise history as to read that many Americans were clamoring to join WW2 before the US was attacked, which it wasn't in the case of the Vietnam war. And it was actually Germany that declared war on the US, not the other way around.

 

Lazarus perhaps ?

 

Agreed,

I don't claim to be an expert on American history particularly where wars are concerned. But from everything I've read, heard, seen in documentaries, and have been told by those who lived and breathed the times, Vietnam was hardly a popular move.. My parents grew up in that generation. I had uncles and second cousins who served during Vietnam.. And they all say the same thing about the draft and the war in general being bullsh-t