Muhammad Ali is arguably the greatest professional boxer of all time and the only fighter to win the heavyweight championship three times, was born Cassius Clay in 1942 in Louisville, Kentucky. Ali passed away on June 3, 2016 in Scottsdale at the age of 74 but his words still live on to this day. Here are 7 Ali quotes that are still impactful in 2022.
1. “Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on Brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights? No I’m not going 10,000 miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over. This is the day when such evils must come to an end. I have been warned that to take such a stand would cost me millions of dollars. But I have said it once and I will say it again. The real enemy of my people is here. I will not disgrace my religion, my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave those who are fighting for their own justice, freedom and equality. If I thought the war was going to bring freedom and equality to 22 million of my people they wouldn’t have to draft me, I’d join tomorrow. I have nothing to lose by standing up for my beliefs. So I’ll go to jail, so what? We’ve been in jail for 400 years.”
2. “I am America. I am the part you won’t recognize. But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own; get used to me.”
3. “I know I got it made while the masses of black people are catchin’ hell, but as long as they ain’t free, I ain’t free.”
4. “I am an ordinary man who worked hard to develop the talent I was given. I believed in myself, and I believe in the goodness of others.”
5. “Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”
6. “Recognize how every moment of our journey is an important part of the growth of our soul.”
7. “A man who views the world the same at 50 as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.”
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Link to original The Black Detour