Opinion: How Muhammad Ali Changed My Life

Editor’s note: The views and opinions expressed below are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sherdog.com, its affiliates and sponsors or its parent company, Evolve Media.

It was inescapable, but I still couldn’t brace myself for the emotional impact with which I was to be hit when it was announced Friday that Muhammad Ali had passed away at the age of 74. For the past few years a story would surface every so often about Ali’s ailing health, but “The Greatest” managed to fight off the inevitable. Death finally caught up with the three-time heavyweight champion and left the world to mourn his passing with the gravity reserved for one of the greatest individuals this universe has ever known.

For this particular writer, Ali was one of the greatest men to ever walk the earth.

As a young African American male, Ali was my everything. Although I was too young to witness him in competition, the legacy he left behind was one that affected me immensely and ultimately led to my becoming a combat sports writer. What he taught me were valuable lessons I would carry throughout my life, and one of those lessons was to fight for everything you believe in and never, ever compromise, no matter the cost. The other was that you aren’t limited by your profession and can strive to be so much more. Oh, and he also taught me that there’s nothing wrong with embracing my blackness, no matter how uncomfortable it may make others feel. To be pro-black isn’t the same as being anti-white. It just meant that Ali loved and embraced his people and ultimately wanted equality for all, although America didn’t quite believe that everyone deserved to be treated equally.

You see, we all talk today about Ali the humanitarian and he’s known as the greatest boxer of all-time, but there was a time when Ali was one of the most reviled individuals in sports. Here was a man -- a black man -- who was considered a loudmouth, arrogant, selfish jerk who just so happened to have remarkable ability as a boxer. Ali existed in an America that was knee deep in the civil rights era. He won Olympic gold a mere six years after Brown vs. Board of Education and four years before the Civil Rights Act of 1964 abolished segregation. Racism in America was still a thing, and Ali refused to compete as a compliant black man.

I don’t need to delve too deeply into Ali’s exile from boxing after he refused to be drafted to army service in the Vietnam War. We all know the story. Some of us wholeheartedly agreed with him while others still consider him a draft dodger who doesn’t care about his country. This was the part of Ali that weighed on me the most. As an African American who fought in a country that consisted of individuals who despised people because of the color of their skin, it made little sense for Ali to fight a war against a country who had no quarrel with him. The real war for African Americans needed to be fought right here in “our” country. Ali simply didn’t believe he should fight for a country that still discriminated against people who looked, walked and talked just like him.

As a teenaged black man, I decided that fighting against racial stereotypes, freedom and human decency was something I would do for the rest of my life, regardless of my professional medium. Ali could have been just a fighter, but he refused to be limited to his profession. When you’re black in America, you fight against so much more than financial security. Regardless of how many decades it has been since the civil rights era, racism is still alive and well in America. Whether it’s the #BlackLivesMatter movement or understanding the reason why individuals support Donald Trump, people being judged and treated unfairly based on the color of their skin is still a very real issue. There’s still a war being fought outside, a war into which we were drafted long before we realized what it was. Ali fought in that war while refusing to take part in a war that had nothing to do with him.

What are we really willing to give up while fighting for what we believe in? Athletes today are moved by the mighty dollar and won’t speak up against issues surrounding race in America because they have to please their corporate sponsors. William C. Rhoden’s “Forty Million Dollar Slaves” outlines in great detail how the modern sports industry is defined by white ownership and black labor; and when some black athletes are paid handsomely enough, they will turn off their race.

Ali would never do such a thing. He gave away the prime years of his boxing career and financial stability because of what he believed in; and what he believed in resonated with me heavily. If Ali could give away the fame and fortune because of his beliefs, I figured that fighting for human decency was the least that I could do, and although I would never become a boxer, I wanted to document the next wave of combat sports athletes and tell the stories about what they were fighting for. Unfortunately, many of them are far too scared to ruffle the feathers of corporate America to stand up for what they believe in. It’s a part of Ali’s legacy that sounds good but isn’t something that athletes today would put into practice. Ali gave up everything for what he believed in as a Black Muslim athlete. He’s the kind of guy that people like Trump would move to have deported. He would challenge black athletes today to do more with their success than live selfishly and flash their money in an effort to shame those who have less.

Fighting was symbolic for Ali and a conduit for his becoming something greater. He taught me that you can compromise now to get ahead today or be resilient and leave a legacy that lasts forever. What is it all worth if you aren’t helping others? That’s why he’s loved today, but you have to remember just how hated and misunderstood he was in the 1960s and 1970s. Not everyone loved Ali.

I decided that I wanted to document the next Ali, should he or she ever come along. As an individual who was shaped and molded by hip hop culture, I realized how important it was to properly document the history of my culture. I wanted to tell the stories of those who were fighting for something. Of course, it was important for me to also prove that African Americans can be great combat sports writers, as well. I wanted to inspire others like Ali inspired me. Ali sparked many young minds to be revolutionary in their thinking. You’re looking at one of those young minds, all grown up and continuing to fight the good fight and hoping to inspire the next generation to do the same.

Ali didn’t give it all away for us to still be misunderstood 40 years later. Ali didn’t fight so we could just get rich. He fought to pay it forward. He fought to inspire everyone. If we are to truly get past race in America, we have to understand what we’re all fighting for. At the end of the day, we’re all really fighting for the same thing.

The fact that Ali was the greatest boxer of all-time simply speaks to how great of a man he was. He was integrity in the face of adversity. It’s easy to be a revolutionary when you don’t have much to lose, but Ali was a revolutionary who had everything to lose; and even when he lost in or out of the ring, he won because he refused to stay down. He was resilient until the very end and proved that everything you believe in is worth fighting for.

Ali taught me that you don’t just have to be a boxer. Ali was a humanitarian, an intellectual, a freedom fighter and everything that you wouldn’t necessarily align with getting punched in the face for a living. His greatness knew no boundaries.

We should all be, in some way, shape or form, thankful for Muhammad Ali. I know I am.

Andreas Hale is the editorial content director of 2DopeBoyz.com, co-host of the boxing, MMA and pro wrestling podcast “The Corner” and a regular columnist for Sherdog.com. You can follow on Twitter for his random yet educated thoughts on combat sports, music, film and popular culture.