I am proud to introduce this talk given by my colleague Michael Palmer. In it, he describes how the knowledge of Aesthetic Realism deeply explains the life of Muhammad Ali, the former heavyweight champion boxer and one of the greatest sporting figures of the 20th century. The understanding of Ali here —the best in him, his opposition to war, his regrets—is great, and something we all can learn from. --JT
Aesthetic Realism shows that true strength in a man is our desire, our need, to have good will for the world and people. In issue 121 of The Right of Aesthetic Realism to Be Known, titled "Good Will Is Aesthetics," Eli Siegel writes:
Good will can be described as the desire to have something else stronger and more beautiful, for this desire makes oneself stronger and more beautiful.
Studying what good will is, and having it as a conscious purpose, has made for big changes in my life. I have deep feeling for people that I never had before. And I learned about the thing in myself and in every person that most weakens our lives — it is contempt, the desire to despise the world, be superior to it. This is the thing that makes us feel our life is a failure.
Aesthetic Realism Explained I Had Two Ideas of Strength
Growing
up in the Bronx, New York, I wanted to become a sportscaster. I hoped to
be able to thrill people with descriptions of action on the playing field. I
was also a very competitive person who, while appearing friendly, inwardly
hoped that people would flop. When I started working as a desk assistant
at WCBS Radio, I was angry that a colleague, who had a similar job, was trying
to advance and might do so ahead of me. I secretly tried to undermine
him, indirectly letting the boss know that he was often on the phone looking
for a better job. When he eventually got fired, I was glad but also so
ashamed that when I'd meet him after that, I was unable to look him in the
eye. I felt beating out other people was how I'd be strong, but I knew I
was dishonest.
In a class I attended in 1972, Mr. Siegel spoke to me about why I felt so bad and I felt understood. He asked:
Do you think there is something that impels one to hope one has had a good effect? Is there an imperative there? Do you think you would feel bad if you felt you had a bad effect on anyone?
"Yes,"
I replied, and Mr. Siegel continued:
Do you like to encourage people? Do you think if you failed to encourage people you would feel bad? The chief thing we are concerned with is what we might have done that we didn't do. Ethics consists of what might be, what is permitted to be, and what needs to be. There is an imperative to think as well of ourselves as we can.
I thank Mr. Siegel for showing me that what
will have us think well of ourselves is having good will, wanting other people
to be strong.
Muhammad Ali and True Strength
I
believe the desire to have good will was impelling former heavyweight boxing
champion Muhammad Ali in 1967 when he spoke out passionately against the brutal
injustice of the U.S. in the Vietnam War. His feeling for the people of
Vietnam who were being killed by American bombs and guns and the courageous
stand he took — refusing to be drafted — was a beautiful example of strength in
a man; and while it resulted horribly in his being banned from boxing for
nearly four years, it made for self-respect in Ali and admiration of him by
people all over the world.
Muhammad Ali was
born Cassius Marcellus Clay in Louisville, Kentucky in 1942, named after an
abolitionist of the 19th century. His father, Cassius Clay Sr., worked as
a painter of billboards and murals and spoke out often at home about the fight
for civil rights in America. His mother, Odessa Clay, worked cleaning homes in
the white, affluent part of the city. In his autobiography, The
Greatest, My Own Story, written with Richard Durham, Ali says:
As early as I can remember I noticed the difference in the way black and white people lived. Louisville was a segregated, racist town; the smell of the old Slave South hung as heavy as the smell of famous whiskey and horses.
In 1956 the vicious murder in
Mississippi of Emmett Till, a young African- American, affected Ali
greatly. Till, only 14, the same age as Ali, was killed by a mob of
whites. Seeing the newspaper accounts enraged the young Cassius Clay, and he
felt he had to get back at white people for Till's death. Days later, he
and a friend vandalized railroad tracks near his home, causing a
derailment. Fortunately no one was hurt. But as Aesthetic Realism
shows, anger, if it is just, is also accurate — in behalf of the world and
people. Ali came to feel the way he showed his anger here was not
accurate, and for years he said he felt ashamed of this occurrence.
In an
Aesthetic Realism lecture of April 1965, Mr. Siegel spoke about why people are
affected by boxing when he discussed an essay by the 19th century English
critic William Hazlitt,
titled "The Fight," about an 1821 boxing match. Mr.
Siegel said that Hazlitt, in describing the match, was giving external form to
fights he felt in himself, including the fight between arrogance and modesty,
simplicity and trickery. Mr. Siegel explained:
We are looking for a good fight because if there isn't a good fight which makes for a conclusion, things in us will be annoying each other perpetually. There are two phases of conflict. One is the possibility that conflict changes into a fight which shows something has a likable result. The other is that conflict go on like a tired worm on a hot day dragging itself across Fifth Avenue. It's very unlikable, and if conflicts are not solved, they grow weary. A weary conflict is one you don't know you have.
I wish Muhammad Ali could have heard
this — that the conflict in him, which is in every person, between liking the
world honestly and finding reasons to have contempt for it, could be in the
open as in a boxing ring, could be understood, and have "a likable
result."
As a boxer,
Muhammad Ali affected people greatly, and I feel that Eli Siegel explains why
in his 1949 lecture, "Poetry and Strength." Speaking of another
great fighter whom Ali admired, Joe Louis, Mr. Siegel says:
Strength is an aesthetic term, really.... One of the things that made Joe Louis strong was the fact that not only did he have a punch, but he had a style with that punch. It was the way he whirled, not only the way he hit.
Ali had style with punch. His noted self-description,
"I float like a butterfly and sting like a bee," moved people.
He was refreshingly new to a sport known primarily for its grimness and
brutality. He said:
When I first came into boxing ... fighters were not supposed to be human and intelligent. Just brutes that exist to entertain and satisfy a crowd's thirst for blood.
Ali, as a fighter, was human and intelligent, but, just as in myself, he had another notion of what would make him strong which was based on contempt — "the lessening of what is different from oneself as a means of self-increase as one sees it." He felt, at times, that he had a right to punish his opponents in the ring. He was criticized for how he was brutal with both Floyd Patterson and Ernie Terrell, extending their fights, punishing them because he felt that as blacks they had been meek about the race issue and were being used by white people.
He was right to
be critical, but he made these fighters' feelings unreal in his mind. Ali felt
bad about this and tried to apologize to Patterson. This showed how deeply
ethics was working in him, and comments on the importance of the question Mr.
Siegel asked me in the earlier discussion, "Do you think you would feel
bad if you felt you had a bad effect on anyone?"
I have seen that boxing as a sport can appeal to contempt in a
person. Mr. Siegel writes in Self
and World, an Explanation of Aesthetic Realism, about the fake strength people can go for. He says:
When a human being rebels against anything, there is anger in him; but he would like very much to change the anger into contempt. It is like a prizefighter summoning up his combative strength to defeat an opponent; but should he find the opponent lying on the floor with the referee counting over him, the prizefighter's purpose has been successful: he can now have the repose of contempt. Anger has pain in it, but contempt is inward bliss; repose; some quietude.
This, I feel, is
why Ali, with all the glory and success he had, was not at peace with himself
about fighting. He said at one point: "True, fighting was all that I
had ever done, but there was something in me that rebelled against it." He
was troubled that he didn't have friendships with opponents, especially with
Joe Frazier. He hoped that together they could use their popularity to
work for justice to black people, but he said their rivalry prevented
this. He once said:
I always try to build up immunity to my opponent's personality, at least until I defeat him. I create a special personality for him and invent, if I have to, motives for my attacks.
Ali would give
his opponents nicknames, say they represented evil, but the best thing in him —
and I admire it very much — objected. Prior to his first fight with Jerry
Quarry, he met Quarry's young son and tells movingly of his thoughts:
Can I pretend hatred for a father whose little boy takes my hand in his, holds the fist that may smash his father's face or limit his father's future or ruin his reputation? ... Then, I dream of Quarry and his son that night, and I wake up in a sweat.
The press hurt
Ali's life. They were vicious and cruel, tried to make fun of him, and said his
religious feeling was fake, which was untrue. Later, seeing his power,
they praised him for his victories, his jokes, but not for his true feeling for
people, his desire to be self-critical.
As a member of the sports press in the late 60's, I regret being a part of news conferences in which press people were thirsty for what we could get from Ali — a funny or demeaning quote about an opponent. We wanted to be superior to him and tried to mock his thoughtfulness, his feeling about justice. And Ali — for all his charm, his humor and seeming braggadocio — was weakened by the press; he did not know how to protect himself from them as he did in the ring.
True Strength Is the Same as Justice
In 1960, at the age of 18, Ali — still known as Cassius Clay — won the Heavyweight title for the U.S. at the Olympics in Rome. But returning to Louisville, he was refused service in a restaurant because he was black. Disillusioned, he threw his Olympic medal in a river. He didn't know why he did it, saying about the medal: "I worshipped it .... It was proof of performance, status ... a symbol of being part of a team, a country and a world." But he said, "I wanted something that meant a lot more than that."
Turning
professional and calling himself "the greatest" and exciting fans by
predicting in what round his opponents would lose, Ali moved to a title shot
against champion Sonny Liston in 1964. But shortly before the fight, he was
introduced to the Islamic religion. In Definitions and Comment: Being a Description of the World, Eli
Siegel defines religion as "the attitude one has towards what one sees as
the biggest or most powerful thing in the world." While I am not
commenting on the Islamic faith, from what I have read, Islam is for the
submitting of oneself with humility to the power of God. Ali, I feel,
wanted to care for something large and good outside of himself. And I also
think he may have been afraid of what winning the championship might do to his
ego — how it might weaken him — and he wanted opposition to it.
But when it became known by the promoters of the fight with Liston that Clay had converted to Islam, they threatened to cancel the fight if he did not renounce his religion. There was intense pressure. Even some of his closest associates advised him to give in. But he refused, saying with strength and conviction that his care for the teachings of Islam was more important than the title. The promoters, who had heavily invested in the fight, were furious, but finally had to back off. The fight went on, and he won the heavyweight title in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history.
Now officially known as Muhammad Ali, he was
about to face a greater fight than the one in the ring. He was furious at
what America was doing in Vietnam--the slaughter of innocent men, women, and
children. He said:
I had seen a series of pictures in a magazine showing mangled bodies of dead Viet Cong laid out along the highway like rows of logs... The only enemy alive was a little naked girl, searching among the bodies, her eyes wide, frightened. I clipped out the picture and the face has never quite left my mind.
Because of his deep ethical objection, which
I respect tremendously, Ali said he would not serve in the Army. He was
threatened, called "unAmerican and a traitor" by the press and boxing
establishment. He was offered deals of special treatment in the
Army. Ali did not waver. He refused induction and was convicted and
sentenced to five years in jail. His title was taken away and he was
barred from boxing. Eli Siegel, who courageously opposed the Vietnam War
from its beginning, composed this poem about Ali in May, 1967, titled "Correction":
Jail LBJ
Not Cassius Clay
Let's all rally
For Muhammad Ali.
Despite the unjust action taken against him, Ali remained strong because he was fighting for the well-being of people. He said: "I felt better than when I beat the 8 to 1 odds and won the title from Liston."
I regret tremendously that during the 1960's I was not against the Vietnam War. I wanted my comfort and what I saw as my right as an American to be superior to people. I felt Ali was reckless, stirring up people needlessly, and rooted against him. I didn't think about justice and I loathed myself for this.
In an Aesthetic Realism Class of 1974, I asked Mr. Siegel about a dream which had troubled me. It was about Muhammad Ali and his upcoming second fight with Joe Frazier. Mr. Siegel, with great kindness, showed how the dream commented centrally on where I was against myself. He asked me: "Do you identify with both of them?" I replied, "More with Frazier, Ali brags too much."
Eli Siegel: He should brag even more. I can't think of a nicer heavyweight. Do you think he has sincere religious feelings?
"Yes,"
I answered. Said Mr. Siegel, "He's a muscular and intellectual
heavyweight." I told Mr. Siegel
that Ali lost the fight in my dream. He asked:
Are you sad about the result? Don't you think you had a preference? Who is more external, who doesn't care more for his deeper feelings?
And he
continued:
You're like most people who don't want to think they have any inner life. It's annoying and a nuisance.... Do you think the purpose of life is to put on a good show? Public and private, inner and outer, do you want to take care of both of them?
Mr.
Siegel then asked me:
Was there a depth that got you to be born? Would you like the deep to explain the superficial or the superficial to make fun of the deep? As soon as you explain the superficial, you have to be deep.
True Strength in a Man in How He Sees Love
Muhammad Ali, like many men, has had pain in love. He has
been married four times. Yet I am moved by how he wanted to see the
mistakes he made with his first wife, Sonji. They had been divorced for
several years, but he interviewed her on tape for his autobiography, wanting
her side of what happened in their marriage to be in it. He said he
wanted to know:
What had really happened to us? Who had been right, who was wrong? What had living with me been like for her? How much had gone unsaid? Maybe she could say now what she had never said before? ... maybe I could listen to her as I had never done.
Later as they spoke, Ali expressed regret to her for not wanting to understand her. This was true strength and shows how hungry he was, and is, to know how to have good will for women.
In an Aesthetic Realism Class taught by Chairman of Education Ellen Reiss, I heard questions about what good will includes, which brought out the best in me. They are now published in The Right of Aesthetic Realism to Be Known, issue 900 under the title "Good Will For Any Person." I had asked what good will would be for the woman I love, Lynette Abel, who, I am glad to say is now my wife, and Ms. Reiss presented these questions. They read in part:
The first thing in good will for Lynette Abel is to ask: Who is Lynette Abel? What does she say about the whole world, and what does the whole world say about her? With that, and arising from it, is: What would it mean for Lynette Abel to be all she can be? What does it mean (and this is a synonym) for Lynette Abel to be as strong as she can be?; as good as she can be?; as beautiful as she can be? What can be the means to encourage that — including, Where could I, Michael Palmer, be a means of encouraging that to be?
Studying these questions together with Lynette, I understand her more deeply, see more keenly her relation to the world and what she is hoping for. I like thinking about what will strengthen her and acting upon it. I feel stronger, kinder, and have greater respect, and there is new, exciting feeling between us. I thank Ellen Reiss for her kind imagination, her knowledge, and good will.
A Man Must Know What Will Make Him Strong
After being banned for three-and-a-half years, Muhammad Ali was able to return to boxing and regain the title in 1974, but he was not the fighter he once was.
In 1984, three years after his last bout, Ali was diagnosed with Parkinson's Syndrome. Despite his illness, he continued all his life to speak out against injustice in the world. He received the United Nations special "Messenger of Peace" citation. In 1990, prior to the Persian Gulf War he went to Baghdad, Iraq and gained the release of hostages. He spoke movingly of Baghdad, saying:
This is the land of the Garden of Eden, and the land where Abraham was born. How could it be bombed.
This
stands for the best thing in a man — which I'm glad to be learning about--the
desire to be kind and just.
Michael Palmer, who had 36 years of experience in radio broadcasting, news and sports, is an Aesthetic Realism associate. He has written important articles — including about racism in sports — which have been published in cities across America.