Arum Blasts Producers of The ‘Thrilla’ Documentary

[MACAQUEINBLACK]

Maybe it is just me trying to defend Frazier. I really like the guy and I don't think what he has gone through he has deserved. I always hear this **** about oh it was so long ago, he should just forgive and forget.. yet they don't know what he went through or what his life was like because of the whole thing. I'm not trying to validate anything, I'm just speaking my opinion on the subject. You guys swear Ali was a saint and a god and he wasn't.

I agree with, and second, the bold.

Difference to me is, acknowledging the trauma it must have caused Frazier doesn't necessarily have to be a retributory thing against Ali.


But I'm done, and I'll leave you to meditate on it however you want.

[nycbigdogI]

I dont understand all this bashing on a true American hero...

First, who the hell cares how Ali treated his opponents??? It not like he picked on some stranger on the street and smacked his mother... Ali employed total warfare campaigns on all his opponents outside the ring as a means of a psychological advantage... A testament to its effectiveness is the fact that over 30 years has passed and his opponents still bear the emotional scars which Ali inflicted.. A fight with Ali was two-fold, inside as well as outside, and this is what people fail to realize...

Secondly, there will never be an athlete of Ali's calibre to use his position, popularity, and wealth and risk them all just for principles... Would Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods lose everything they sacrificed countless years just to oppose racist and unjust governmental policies??? Never...

Remember, Ali only had to be inducted into the military, but he was never ever going to be placed in the front lines just as most well known athletes in the military... He probably would have had to put on exhibitions to boost moral.. But instead he refused and at the prime of his carreer he was stripped of his belts, boxing license, and ability to make a living... Noone and I mean noone in sports today would even consider going through what Ali did...

Oh, and the Metro-Sexual guy comparing the KKK with the Nation of Islam is utterly ******. Yes, both 'organisations' believe in segregation of races but thats where the similarities end... KKK has murdered thousands of innocent people of every minority race and has terrorized this country for two hundred years... Im no supporter of NOI but crearly to say the two groups is the counterpart of the other is downright ******ed...

[supremelygifted]

No he didn't. Jack Johnson was before him and was far superior to him in that regard considering the danger he was in.


So it was alright for Ali to do what he did?

To call Frazier an "Uncle Tom"?
And to basically force him out of favor among other "black" people by labeling him a trader.

Yeah, that went real well and no harm was done to Frazier or his family.


To say he looked like a gorilla...which would be interesting to have seen if that remark came from a "white" person.

Not really. Jack Johnson got under his opponent's skin just because of the color of his own skin. The weren't going to let a N!gga beat them. He was determined he would. He was the only black man in America to get paid to beat up white folks. That is a different form of psychology. Ali actually sought to antagonize his opponents . In a way you're right. Johnson had the hate of his opponents. Ali created it.

Ali was not right. No one is saying that. Are you black? Have you talked to any black people about that? I grew up during that time and Frazier was not out favor with blacks. As a matter of fact, many of your 'hood' folks was going for Frazier. You know the people that usually don't matterto most on this board? The ones many insult and look down upon. You could go into any barbershop and half the people were for Ali and half for Frazier. Believe me!!!! I never heard anyone in the black community taking what Ali said seriously. That was a show for white folks. Ali knew Joe was a real hood brotha and that would piss him off to call him an uncle tom. These are things that if you're not black you wouldn't nor I not understand. Just like we don't like others don't see what the big deal about calling a Puerto Rican a Mexican. That was an internal game Ali played with Joe. You watch one documentary and think you have a grasp of the whole thing. Yet, you're actually taking everything way out of context. The funny thing about your post is you reference his beliefs behind the living separate issue. MANY blacks and whites were in agreement on that during that time. Most blacks DIDN'T want to live among white people which turns out to be a ****** way of thinking. While the KKK wanted separate living lifestyles. Ali and many blacks were for separate BUT equal. Your lack of knowledge about the subjects you post about only shows that you watch too much ****ing TV.

[MACAQUEINBLACK]

I understand where Vic is coming from. He's a fan of Frazier as a fighter and as a man, and, like me, he's been dismayed by the longstanding popular perception of a heroic fighter as an embittered whiner.
Looking at it through a media lens -- without the kind of first-hand social insight which gives a guy like supremelygifted above some more nuanced perspective on certain sensationalized elements of the story -- Frazier seems to be the unhip whipping boy of now as he was then...even moreso, since that negative perception of him seems to have spread like pop culture wildfire while Ali has become more pedastalized and all negative public perceptions of him have pretty much softened. It seems like those events have never had a fair reappraisal and Joe has been stuck on DEFCON1 for 30+ years.

But justice for all that is better dispensed in the form of real talk about who Frazier is and why Ali was out of line, rather than overlooking all of Ali's positive influence and writing him off. Ali's guilty of being impressionable and acting crazily, but I'm not sure he really comprehended the impact his behaviour would have, immediate or long term. And in those days, he probably was a bit crazy. Hard to see everything as it is when you're subject to the kind of pressures and influences he was subject to. Who can judge? It's between Joe, Ali and God, The Great Pooh Bear Of The Golden Light, Karma, whatever you want to call it.

[MACAQUEINBLACK]

Ali came to my high school (Centennial High School 1999 compton california)
and he donated money for computers and books.
sign gloves and gave at least 300 individual pictures.. and I remember actually seeing this man in person thinking to myself damn here is a person who cant even really talk no more but literally had the entire school shutting the fucck up and listening to every word he tryed to speak.

this man is the sole reason allot of people even stared watching boxing.
and he is the first athlete to stand for something that mattered
in the post jackie Robinson era of sports.

to this day they will never be another athlete more important than Ali.
No one.

Great post.

To the bold, there's an argument to make that Pelé was/is as important and stood for something - outside Northern America, at least.

[membrane]

America showed racism is a thing of the past and now has an ***** for a president. Black and white, what's the difference? You can't see one without the other. Pacquiao is brown, but he aint down.

[ugly2000]

I wish Arum wouldnt be interviewed anymore. This dude is a first class clown.

[billionaire]

the thrilla documentary is just for saps that feel sorry for a sore loser.......

[elfag]

It was a good documentary.

Yes ali was an ******* back then, people forget that and only want to say good things about him since he is disabled now but he did cheat on his wife despite claiming to be super religious and he did go far beyond just promoting a fight calling fraizer all those names.

what you want the documentary to just pretend that never happened and be all about Ali and how wonderful he was?

Theyre is already a ton of documentaries just like that. Let fraizer share his side for once.

[Dave Rado]

when you are married to another woman and you are seeing one that not her.. that is your mistress REGARDLESS of whether you marry her 3 months later or not.

Telling a partial truth rather than the whole truth is a lie by omission.

And WTF relevance was that affair to telling Frazier's side of the story anyway? Frazier was never married to either woman so it's completely irrelevant.