Was Muhammed Ali a pacifist?

Question

I've heard that he's a pacifist, but I also heard he said that just to get out of going to Vietnam? What's true here?

Answer 1

It was for his religous beliefs. I think he probably would describe himself as a pacifist now which for some people might be hard to understand as he was a boxer but they are two different things entirely.

Answer 2

It was against his beliefs to kill another human being. He resolved his issues in the ring where people live to fight another day. The way it should be....

Answer 3

Muhammad Ali came out before any one else and said this war was wrong. "No Vietcong ever called me Ni99er" thats quite the statement for a any person back in the 60's before the hippie movement to say. Especially a black man.

Ali knew that if he entered the war he would be kept off the front lines and probably box exhibition bouts for the solders. But Ali refused because of his beliefs. It cost him his heavyweight title, millions of dollars in legal fees and 3 years of his prime gone. Ali was flat broke for 3 years and had to resort to selling Ali burgers and pop.

All that money though went back to his layers.  Muhammad Ali was anything but a pacifist. He had his beliefs and he let them be known. In a time when Malcom X was assassinated for his views on the war and America. Ali still stuck to his guns.

When he went before the boxing commission all he had to do to be reinstated as champion and get his license back to fight was apologies for his remarks to the boxing commission. He still refused. Thats commitment.

He went and spoke to a dictator of Korea i think it was and convinced him to release P.O.W's.

The man brought all kind of unnecessary heat down on himself. So to call him a pacifist.... No

Answer 4

yes

Answer 5

He didnt believe his government  should be in Vietnam, so why should he kill and maybe die for them.

Answer 6

A coward.

Answer 7

Muhammad Ali refused to fight in Vietnam because he knew that our government had no business trying to impose a dictatorship on the Vietnamese people, who were fighting for their independence first against the Japanese, then against the French colonialists, and finally against the United States.  He knew that it was nonsensical to go to Vietnam to fight when there was plenty to fight for here:  desegregation, voting rights for black people, an end to poverty.  His willingness to give up his heavyweight championship title for his beliefs, and risk imprisonment for refusing the draft, makes him the greatest champion ever!