Draft resistance paid off for Ali

Mana (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 6, 15 September 1977, Page 11

Draft resistance paid off for Ali

Muhammad Ali had his world heavyweight boxing title taken away after he refused the military draft. To many people this must have seemed a tragic blow to a brilliant boxing career, but that’s not how Ali saw it.

“1 wouldn’t be as great or as popular as 1 am,”confides Ali, “if they hadn’t taken my title. When they took my crown because of my religious beliefs, which told me not to participate in an unjust war; that made me bigger. 1 was bigger for not going to Vietnam. 1 was bigger for giving up millions in commercial endorsements and fight money to go to jail. “And it also made bigger financially because while 1 was

gone from fighting Joe Frazier, Ken Norton and George Foreman were developing during my exile. Then 1 came back and made $5 million on Frazier. $5 million on Foreman and $6 million on Norton. $l6 million in three fights because my title was taken from me and they built up those contenders. If 1 had dept on fighting without the draft thing, 1 probably would never have made that money. 1 would have beat them earlier. “So, the draft issue didn’t hurt me. It came at the prime of my life. They couldn’t have written a movie on my life without that. The setbacks. The temptations. The controversy. The drama. The violence. The love. The hate. And everything else involved. You couldn’t make a movie based on fiction which would be as great as what has happened to me in my real life. “So, when someone suggests that 1 might have been greater if they hadn’t taken those years from me, 1 point out that what made me greater was the fact that they did take those years. You’ve got to realise that what made me bigger was the fact that they crucified me. “Why was Jesus the number one prophet? Moses was far more successful. Noah, Lot and Abraham were successful. If anything, Jesus was the failure. Jesus died saying: ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ Yet Jesus was ithe most loved, the mosty

talked about, the most remembered. They pitied Him because He suffered and was tortured on that cross. “Well, they tortured me. I me suffer. 1 hey wouldn’t allow me to work. I hey took my livelihood. They did things to me they wouldn't do to nobody else. And this was what made me big. This made me a hero. This made me more valuable. And this is what makes good moveies. “Jack Johnson is the name you remember from the old boxers because he was a maverick. Wyatt Earp and Jesse James are the ones you remember from the old west, not the good guys. If I had been the good ol’ guy who went into the army and waved the flag. I’d have been just another boxer: iust another

man. But now' I’m recognized throughout the world and I’m doing a movie that’s going to sell in Egypt. Saudi Arabia, Morocco, I urkey, Indonesia, Pakistan, Algeria, the Sudan, England, Scotland. France. Germany. Russia. C hina. My crucifixion had a lot to do with that. “They said what I did then was wrong. 1 hat it would destroy me. I hat I was going to be assassinated. Now. people are seeing that wher you lake a stand for God and for what you truly believe in you w in in the long run. All ol that backfired on'the system and now I’m a movie star after making $4l millioi dollars as a fighter. Only the fools will think I los somethin’. 1 didn't lost nothin'. The money will be even bigger now.”