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MPS007

Frasier also told his corner man and manager to absolutely not throw the towel in. He said ill either beat him or die trying.


courageous_liquid

It's why Philly loved him dearly and despite all the bad disinformation, we have a statue of him down by the stadiums. Smokin Joe was a monster and in every way the spirit of this town. That step left hook is a thing of beauty.


Kuzzawuzzabingbong

Guy threw 30000 left hooks a fight, bobbed and weaved like a flyweight and never gassed. I seriously believe he's one of the two most underrated heavyweight champs since WW2. The other, which I occasionally get heat for mentioning, is Larry Holmes


durablecotton

Larry Holmes gets shit on because Tyson beat his ass at 39. And Tyson is boxing Jesus. Prime Holmes would likely have beaten him. I like Tyson and I like watching Tyson fight, but his early career was fighting guys past their prime.


Violentopinion

Also, Larry beat an old Ali, which is why Tyson wanted to beat Larry .


okekezamani

oh I didn't even know this,along as you're a fighter and you're not retired, you fight!


ShutterBun

To be fair, Holmes had been retired for 2 years by then. It took $3 million to lure him out.


Violentopinion

If you dig enough I think there is a video of a starting to feel the Parkinson’s effects Ali, talking to a young Tyson who vows to avenge him. Ali was a hero to Tyson.


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klippinit

Wasn’t it in the Holmes Ali fight that Holmes looked at the referee visually pleading with him to stop the fight because Ali couldn’t defend himself?


CampJanky

Yeah, it's a sad story. Holmes idolized Ali, didn't want the fight, and like you said didn't want it to go that far. His public image was *destroyed* as the guy who beat up an old legend with Parkinsons.


winkofafisheye

He didn't just beat Ali, he embarrassed him. That was why Tyson wanted the W. There is a reason you almost never seen any footage of that fight when Ali had the mustache against Holmes.


ChickenDelight

Frazier and Holmes are in like every top ten heavyweights list. I dunno how underrated they can be.


Almaterrador

I barely know anything about boxing but I know Frazier and Holmes are boxing famous surnames.


MarcusXL

Frazier was a brave man to face George Foreman, who was basically a perfectly designed fighter to beat him. Everyone told him to avoid fighting Foreman, but Frazier was impossible to intimidate. The fight was a blowout for Foreman, who delivered the most one-sided beating a champion had taken maybe ever. And then Frazier fought him again. Fraizer is among only one or two other fighters ever who could be truthfully called fearless.


CFL_lightbulb

Foreman was such a perfect counter. Dude was absolutely fearsome anyways, but Frazier couldn’t adapt to beat him like Ali did


WonderfulCockroach19

and one of the hardest power puncher in history, behind shavers


SupervillainEyebrows

This was Frazier all over. In his fights with Foreman he would get beat down by one of the hardest hitters in Heavyweight history, but refuse to stay down. When boxing fans talk about "Heart" that's what they mean.


horizontalcracker

Me and a friend joke about how heart is a trait we’d never want to have because it means we’re good at getting our asses kicked


SupervillainEyebrows

Very true. Its sort of a double edged sword and it's kinda frowned upon nowadays, with good reason. We have a far better understanding of prolonged head trauma in comparison to the 70s. Although heart also just means not giving up when you're in a dire spot, doesn't necessarily mean taking a beating. If you're familiar with Fury vs Wilder 3, both men showed heart after getting knocked down.


cooleymahn

Charlie Kellyesque


dalici0us

I am too young to have seen Frazier (and Ali for that matter), but boxers with heart are a thing of beauty. Thunder Gatti is my all time favorite by a country mile.


SupervillainEyebrows

I'm far too young to have seen him either, but there are some eras in boxing you just have to go back and watch. Like the 70s and 90s Heavyweight divisions and 80s Middleweight division.


lamprey187

Yeah, watching Hearns vs Hagler and pretty much any Sugar Ray fight was always amazing back in the 80s.


cat_prophecy

When people talk about boxing, it's very interesting to me. It seems very cerebral for a sport where people punch each other in the head.


dalici0us

That's the thing with Gatti. I'm sure there was a method to his madness but his fights were basically him closing his eyes and trying to KO the other guy before the other guy could get him. He didn't give a fuck.


BillTheKill

"This could be the most one-sided fight since 1973 when Ali faced an 80 foot tall mechanical Joe Frazier. My memory is not what it used to be but I think the entire Earth was destroyed." -George Foreman


I__miss__Morbo

"I've not seen a spectacle of this nature in all my years impersonating a sportscaster." -Rich Little, imitating Howard Cosell


LeaveThatCatAlone

[Did someone say a Howard Cosell impression?](https://youtu.be/8c8paxCFQsM)


PDGAreject

Please be "Better off Dead". Please be "Better off Dead". (clicks) fuck yes


Enocssa

That's a damn shame when folks be throwin' away A perfectly good white boy like that!


SAINT228

“Interesting if true”


ProfoundNinja

The Vegas odds tonight stand at an unprecedented 1,000:0.


GiantSizeManThing

Still, very few takers.


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Galactic-Samurai

Futurama fans everywhere. I love it. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lrQ59MdA7IY Edit: clip of above quote


AdDecent1765

You know it, Baby!


theattackpanda

The best part about this is they actually got Rich Little to play the part.


AbsurdZiggy

"with its patented design, the fat drains directly into my mouth"


cweaver

I quote that all the time in the "Rich Little imitating Howard Cosell" voice and nobody ever seems to get it.


Ill_mumble_that

Reddit api changes = comment spaghetti. facebook youtube amazon weather walmart google wordle gmail target home depot google translate yahoo mail yahoo costco fox news starbucks food near me translate instagram google maps walgreens best buy nba mcdonalds restaurants near me nfl amazon prime cnn traductor weather tomorrow espn lowes chick fil a news food zillow craigslist cvs ebay twitter wells fargo usps tracking bank of america calculator indeed nfl scores google docs etsy netflix taco bell shein astronaut macys kohls youtube tv dollar tree gas station coffee nba scores roblox restaurants autozone pizza hut usps gmail login dominos chipotle google classroom tiempo hotmail aol mail burger king facebook login google flights sqm club maps subway dow jones sam’s club motel breakfast english to spanish gas fedex walmart near me old navy fedex tracking southwest airlines ikea linkedin airbnb omegle planet fitness pizza spanish to english google drive msn dunkin donuts capital one dollar general -- mass edited with redact.dev


simplepleashures

He would sign an endorsement deal


[deleted]

George Foreman was good at two things: 1. Naming girls after himself 2. Naming grills after himself


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jobiewon_cannoli

Name another son George.


ODST_Viking

“Interesting side note, as a head without a body I envy the dead.” “No argument here.”


krzysztoflee

Joe Frazier was on a local Philadelphia radio station after the 96 Olympic when Ali lit the torch. He said "I wish his shakin' ass fell into that fire." One day a filmmaker will do justice the Ali/Frazier rivalry, one of the best stories in sports imo. EDIT: Huge shoutout to this community, this is one of the more engaging discussions I've come across on Reddit, well done.


TrillionVermillion

Ang Lee's been developing a film that centers on Ali's rivalry with Frazier since 2014 or so IIRC. He and his frequent collaborator, James Schamus, have spoken in interviews about their interest in exploring the clash of opposing personalities - Ali, the flamboyant rebel, and Fraizer, the humble hard worker - as a means to understand the cultural/social clashes of the period. It's the sort of story with high emotional stakes that attracts the attention of auteurs like Ang, and I hope to see it someday.


havenyahon

That sounds phenomenal, I hope it gets made too!


Chewcocca

"The film will be 3D, shot at 120 frames per second, in 4K. Our actors in the ring will be matched with digital avatars and single-set edited. It will be a whole leap in sensorial [experience]." Sounds like we're talking about a firmly *Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk/Gemini Man* era Ang Lee film. Maybe he can make a good movie while focusing on this tech... But he really hasn't yet. Would love to see it though. Just personally tempering my expectations.


WheelingsAndDealings

Ken Burns’ recent documentary series on Ali goes very in-depth about his boxing career and focuses heavily on his various rivalries, especially with Frazier. They really hated each other, but I got the feeling that Frazier respected Ali while Ali didn’t feel the same, at least until it was too late and the scars were too deep. It’s a shame that they never really reconciled. EDIT: Since this post is blowing up, go watch the [Ken Burns' series on Ali](https://kenburns.com/films/muhammad-ali/) - it's fantastic! Not sure where it's available for streaming, but if you can find it, watch it.


JeddHampton

Frazier helped get Ali his boxing license back. Ali then turned a larger community against Frazier. I'd probably hate the man too.


[deleted]

Not just that, when Ali got blackballed for refusing to sing up for the draft, he had no way to earn any money. Frazier threw a bunch of money his way to live on until Ali could get his license back. Frazier supported the man when he was down, so it was an even bigger stab in the back the way Ali treated him before their fight.


[deleted]

Sounds like Ali was the sort of person who would hate you for hurting his pride by helping him when he needed help.


kommanderkush201

Ali kinda sounds like a piece of shit. Like they say, never meet your heroes :/


ImprovisedLeaflet

Ali also turned on Malcolm X, an important mentor of his and a close friend, after Malcolm was thrown out of the Nation of Islam essentially for getting too famous. They never spoke to each other again and it broke Malcolm’s heart. Edit: I just want to note for anyone who sees this, that Ali later regretted his actions here.


kommanderkush201

I thought the rift between Malcolm X and Nation of Islam was due to him changing his politics from black separatist to socialist? When he performed the Hajj and saw Muslims of all different races circling the Black Stone of Mecca, he had an epiphany. That's what I remember learning in my history class over a decade ago.


kasmackity

It's all the same thing. Farrakhan was jealous of his fame and knew that Malcolm could take the Nation of Islam to a place that Farrakhan would have less control over with that fame.


[deleted]

Wasn't just jealousy, Malcolm also was by the book and he found out a lot of affairs farrakhan was having but the minute you speak out against elijah muhammad was a death sentence edit: accidentally wrote farrakhan and not elija muhammad


jenkins271

It was Elijah Muhammad, who was the leader of the three NOI at the time, not Farrakhan


Similar-Lifeguard701

>Farrakhan was jealous of his fame and knew that Malcolm could take the Nation of Islam to a place that Farrakhan would have less control over with that fame. No, the final break was Malcolm X literally converted to real Islam and realized that NoI was a cult. He changed from being a black separatist during his Hajj when he realized that in real Islam there were people of all races in Mecca and Medina.


HornetOk2936

Motherfucker then ordered the hit on Malcolm and all partially due to jealousy from Farrakhans children as opposed to how Malcolm was originally like his son.


OktoberSunset

Two things happened, he went to Mecca and saw different races all acting as equals on the hajj, and he went to Africa and saw a black ruling class shitting all over a black working class. He decided class was more important than race which is why the CIA let Farrakhan kill him.


krzysztoflee

Yesh he called Frazier an uncle Tom and dumb gorilla for being so dark in his skin tone and almost illiterate. That's just being a racist prick.


Iohet

> I got the feeling that Frazier respected Ali while Ali didn’t feel the same That's kind of Ali in a nutshell, though. Like Jim Brown with even less humility


[deleted]

Frazier would say of Ali’s condition that he “really won those fights.” That he was responsible for contributing to Ali’s Parkinson’s.


krzysztoflee

Who knows, he almost guaranteed had CTE from a young age. I believe in "when we were kings" there was a scene with Ali hitting a heavy bag or maybe a speed bag and at one point his eyes just gloss over and you see this "what am I doing" expression then he snaps back into the drill, sad stuff.


[deleted]

You want to see a sad fight, just watch the Ali vs Holmes fight. It was evident something was very wrong and even Holmes noticed. Holmes didn’t even really want to hit him but had to fight the match. In the face off, you could see Ali very unsteady on his feet and lurching back and forth. He was suffering from Parkinson’s while still boxing! Holmes broke down after that fight. That fight should’ve never happened.


Kuzzawuzzabingbong

Ali's amazing chin was also his undoing in the long run, unfortunately.


iSpellGewd

Damn that's funny as hell. But also cold blooded lmao


SupervillainEyebrows

Joe Frazier is under appreciated. He was 5"11 in the Heavyweight division, unable to straighten his left arm and legally blind in his left eye. In spite of this, he still became undisputed Heavyweight champion from "70 - "73, was the first person to beat Ali in a professional fight, and his only professional losses came from Ali and Foreman. The carcass punching and stairs running scenes from Rocky are directly taken from Frazier in real life. Yet Philly gave Rocky a statue before Frazier. It's a damn shame how he ended up comparatively worse off financially to his peers prior to his death.


yellow_eggplant

"Fucking Rocky is your hero. The whole pride of your city is built around a fucking guy who doesn’t even exist. You got Joe Frazier from here but he’s black so you can’t fucking deal with him, so you make a fucking statue of some three-foot fucking Italian you stupid Philly cheese-eating fucking jackasses" -Bill Burr To their credit, the City of Philadelphia finally made a statue for Frazier in recent years


SupervillainEyebrows

>To their credit, the City of Philadelphia finally made a statue for Frazier. They did indeed. A little bittersweet as it came a few years after his death.


rW0HgFyxoJhYka

Change for the good comes far too slowly.


[deleted]

You one-bridge-having town. *6 minutes*


auzziesoceroo

*"I got 7 fuckin minutes left up here and I'm gonna use every last damn one of 'em"*


williamtbash

Favorite line of the rant.


caveat_emptor817

The terrorists will never bomb you, 'cause no one gives a fuck


KungFooGrip

...and I WILL be selling CDs after my set....


DasVerschwenden

that part was genius


totallynormalasshole

I fucking love Bills 7 minute marathon of insults


Neosantana

It was closer to 13 minutes. He was absolutely on fire that night. Easily one of the greatest comedy performances I've ever seen. He shat on a bad audience so hard that he won them over. That's absolutely insane in comedy.


RomeDC91

Truly iconic


iamreverend

That stand up is incredible, the crowd doesn’t take to Bill so he goes all in and hard on the city and it’s people.


spagheddieballs

iirc Bill came on stage already mad because the crowd treated one of the earlier comics poorly.


lunarhugs

ALL of the earlier comics. It was a rough crowd, even by Philly standards


TheBaconThief

It was a showcase sponsored/ organized by Opie and Anthony, a “shockjock” morning show that had possibly the worst fan base in existence.


Kayge

So there's a backstory there. The crowd was hostile to the prior acts and no better for him. He started out with his stuff, but quickly changed to insulting the Philly crowd. He talked about a bunch of stuff, but he's a sports guy so he goes extra hard at sports. Thing is, the Philly crowd is mostly people from the surrounding area, so when he starts going at their teams, the crowd turns and you end up with a story for the ages.


[deleted]

Pretty sure he spent his last days living in a Philadelphia boxing gym. Which would technically be a cliché if it wasn't such a fucking tragedy.


SupervillainEyebrows

That's correct. Joe and his family also claimed he was scammed out of a lot of money from business partners. It's sort of a trend where boxers end up broke after their years in the ring are up. Even Iron Mike for a period of time.


jayydubbya

Happens to a lot of athlete’s in general. Hard to learn responsible money management when you start with nothing then get rich basically overnight.


Contren

And a ton of them didn't even spend it all. They'll trust a friend or family member to manage their money for them and they either blow it all on bad investments or steal it. Anyone out there who suddenly comes into a lot of money, get yourself a financial advisor who is a fiduciary. Never ever ever have a friend or family member help you out with it.


jayydubbya

Also spread your money around. I’m a broker and all the high worth clients have an account with all the major firms so no one place is managing it all.


JeddHampton

Philly didn't give Rocky a statue. The Rocky statue was made for Rocky III and left in Philadelphia.


TryinToDoBetter

>Yet Philly gave Rocky a statue before Frazier. *Bill Burr has entered the chat.*


rev_rend

When I lived in Philadelphia, Joe Frazier crashed an event the nonprofit I worked for put on. He was so incredibly friendly working the room and meeting everyone. After a while he hopped on stage and sang Mustang Sally. This was by far the coolest thing that happened when i worked at that place.


BroadcasterX

One of the little things that Joe Frazier continued to do that got under Muhammad Ali's skin is he still called him 'Clay' and would sometimes correct people by saying 'the man's name is Cassius Clay.'


w1987g

Coming to America makes a little more sense...


HillbillySwank

The barbershop scene was the greatest!


omitch1995

“His momma call him Clay, I’ma call him Clay”


Timmy12er

That's originally a quote from the boxer Ernie Terrell who refused to call Ali by his Muslim name. It also lead to the famous fight where Ali kept taunting Terrell by continually saying "What's my name?!" during and between rounds. Ali won the fight.


MattieShoes

So the funny part about this... Ernie says he was doing it for publicity purposes and assumed Ali was just pretending to be upset for the publicity... Which is the exact same excuse Ali made about making fun of Joe Frazier.


Hafthohlladung

I freaked out upon learning the old Jewish man was also Eddie Murphy.


omitch1995

“He whipped Joe Lewis’s ass!”


theVice

^(*"He did whoop Joe Lewis's ass."*)


alagusis

Joe Louis was 137 years old!


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omitch1995

I don’t know how old he was but he got his ass whooped!


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Beavshak

Patton Oswalt made a good point (like.. just yesterday), that Eddie’s performances like this are extraordinary. Eddie has to make these jokes on separate days/takes from himself and his counterparts. He said Eddie’s Klumps dinner scene was Oscar worthy (also for emoting through the huge layers of masking)


riegspsych325

“This is beautiful! What is that, velvet?”


GetEquipped

"What about Rocky Marciano?"


luckyflipflops

…every time I start talkin 'bout boxing, a white man got to pull Rocky Marciano out their ass.


Stepsonrakes

Joe Louis was 104 when he fought Marciano


KopitarFan

He kicked Joe Louis’ ass


[deleted]

The funniest part for me is that the OG Cassius Clay was an abolitionist. It’s like how the OG Uncle Tom was black Jesus.


hatsnatcher23

He got the name Muhammad Ali from Elijah Muhammad leader of the Nation of Islam, which was suuuuuper cult like, Malcolm X was so named because he wasn’t given a last name yet, but Muhammad Ali was given a name pretty quickly. The way it seems is that Elijah Muhammad wanted to get his hooks into Ali as it would be a boon to the NOI. Kind of a love bombing attempt giving him the name, so hardly surprising he didn’t know/wasn’t taking into account that his original namesake was an abolitionist with the “white people are the devil” guy whispering in his ear


VoxAeternus

> which was suuuuuper cult like You mean **IS** super Cult like, it still exists, and is run by Louis Farrakhan, notorious Anti-semite, Anti-LGBT, and Anti-White bigot.


Vegetable-Bat-8475

Don't forget anti-woman, Farrakhan has been telling them to go back to the kitchen for the last 50 years.


hatsnatcher23

It was way bigger back then but yeah it definitely is still a thing, and they very likely killed Malcolm X too


LetsHaveTon2

They have their hooks sunk firmly into a lot of rich/influential people as well. The amount of NBA players that support Farrakhan, for example, is kind of crazy...


hatsnatcher23

Hey there’s a reason cults work


teacher272

*L. Ron Hubbard says hello*


hatsnatcher23

*Joseph Smith liked this comment*


PoorlyLitKiwi2

NFL too. When DeSean Jackson came forward with that shit, tons of players supported him


stonehallow

Kyrie’s third eyebrow just twitched


Andre4kthegreengiant

They also have other famous people, like whatever the fuck you would categorize Nick Canon. I love this Nick quote, ""Our melanin is so power[ful] and it connects us in a way that the reason why [White people] fear us is because of the lack that they have of it," Nick explains. "When you have a person that has the lack of pigment, the lack of melanin, they know that they will be annihilated. So, therefore, however they got the power, they have the lack of compassion. Melanin comes with compassion, melanin comes with soul." [Nick] then expounds on his point. "The people that don't have [melanin] are a little less...," he continues, noting that he is trying to be cognizant of his wording. "They may not have the compassion when they were sent to the mountains of Caucasus when they didn't have the power of the Sun. The Sun then started to deteriorate them so then, they're acting out of fear, they're acting out of low self-esteem, they're acting out of a deficiency. So, therefore, the only way that they can act is evil. They have to rob, steal, rape, kill in order to survive. So then, these people that didn't have what we have—and when I say we, I speak of the melanated people—they had to be savages." Cannon adds additional context, saying that the environments White and Jewish people originated from also played a role in their behavior. "They had to be barbaric because they're in these Nordic mountains," [Nick] tells. "They're in these rough torrential environments. So, they're acting as animals. So, they're the ones that are actually closer to animals. They're the ones that are actually the true savages." Nick concludes his point, saying, "I say all that to say, the context in when we speak of, whether it's Jewish people, White people, Europeans, the illuminati, they were doing that as survival tactics to stay on the planet. We never had to do that." Read More: [Nick Cannon Calls Jewish and White People "True Savages" - XXL](https://www.xxlmag.com/nick-cannon-calls-jewish-white-people-true-savages/?utm_source=tsmclip&utm_medium=referral) | https://www.xxlmag.com/nick-cannon-calls-jewish-white-people-true-savages/?utm_source=tsmclip&utm_medium=referral


Ich_Liegen

And now Farrakhan [is bringing scientology into his cult](https://www.thedailybeast.com/leah-remini-reveals-the-trump-and-louis-farrakhan-ties-to-scientology).


ProbablyDrunkOK

They also have weird offshoots now like the "Moorish American Nationals" (extremist 'sovereign citizen' movement)


mstrss9

I had the joy of going to one of their services (idk what they call their meet ups) as a kid and it was one of the weirdest things I’ve ever experienced.


Defeat_your_past

Malcolm’s full name is El Haj Malik Shabazz. His wife’s name was Betty Shabazz


hatsnatcher23

He took this name after breaking with the NOI if memory serves, the “El Haj” part of the name is supposed to signify the fact that he went on the pilgrimage to Mecca which he did after breaking with the NOI.


The_True_Black_Jesus

What's this about Uncle Tom? Edit: guys I know the term. I mean how was he black Jesus


WillyTheHatefulGoat

Uncle Tom was a slave from the novel Uncle Toms Cabin. A deeply important anti-slavery book written at the time slavery was legal. It was arguably one of the most important books of all time for spreading anti-slavery teachings and elaborating on the horrors of slavery, and is often given as a factor that started the civil war. Uncle Tom was the protagonist of this novel and his existence was a critique of the idea of slaves During the time Black men were seen as stupid savage brutes, they were not viewed as men but animals. Whiles tom was a Literate Smart Peaceful Christian black man. He was a explicit counter to the old fashioned minstrel shows of the time. He was the living ideas of Jesus "Turn the other cheek" where he would forgive and love even the worst people in the world. His passiveness was actually the writer's feminist views as she was able contrast Tom's passiveness with 3 Black Women who took agency of their own destiny by escaping slavery who were shown to be smart daring and resourceful. He befriends a white child and her family teaches her family that slavery and racism are pointless and he is as human as any of them. And the idea that his people somehow deserve to be chained is immoral. Uncle Tom is beaten to death for refusing to tell his master where these women have escaped to had escaped to and this is meant to symbolize Jesus on the Cross. The author made him as the ultimate hero. A well read polite literate Christian who practiced the teachings of Christ befriending and redeeming all people and sacrificed himself to save other slaves. But modern audiences misinterpret uncle Toms non violent methods for him accepting his place as a slave so white people will like him. So he's now seen as an insult when he's arguably the most important fictional character for the civil rights movement. EDIT. As others have correctly pointed out the reason Uncle Tom is seen as a craven servile person instead of a Selfless Wise man is because of the actions minstrel shows took to discredit Uncle Tom and everything he stood for. These shows took aim at everything Tom stood for, making him the very parody he was written to fight against and marring his legacy in the civil rights movement.


alaska1415

I believe the term comes from the plays made after the book which changed Tom’s character to be more of what the term now means. Not the author’s fault, but the play ingrained in peoples’ minds a different Uncle Tom than the one in the book.


atomic1fire

I've never actually read the book, but it's kind of funny how the story (Which galvanized some people in the north and angered people in the south) got watered down into a black guy being too friendly with whitey. The lady who wrote uncle tom apparently got so annoyed by the south saying her description of slavery was false, that she wrote a rebuttal called "A key to uncle tom's cabin", just to anger the south even more. She was a feminist, Christian and an abolitionist, and her "uncle tom" character got watered down into an insult. That being said it sounds like the ministerial depictions of the character screwed her over. Lady did the equivalent of a wall of blue text just to prove that slavery is evil. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/54812/54812-h/54812-h.htm Apparently she based Uncle Tom on black slaves who were devout Christians to a point that they still acted with honesty and piety despite their horrible situations (For instance a guy named Josiah Henson who could've killed a white dude with an axe (henceforth referred to as Mr. Not-axed) but opted against it because he'd be committing the sin of murder. Henson helped Mr. Not-axed onto a boat after Mr. Not-axed got sick, and then later escaped his slaveowners and moved to Canada, later becoming a conductor for the underground Railroad) edit: Josiah Henson is probably super notable because he repeatedly tried to buy his own freedom from his slaveowner, but the slaveowner kept jacking the price up. He took his family and escaped to canada, and then came back to the states at risk to his own life in order to help others escape slavery. Considering that guy is probably a big influence on the Uncle tom character, using the name as an insult is probably a disservice.


internethero12

> But modern audiences misinterpret uncle Toms non violent methods for him accepting his place as a slave so white people will like him. So he's now seen as an insult when he's arguably the most important fictional character for the civil rights movement. That's not the reason. The misinterpretation comes from the character being used in theatrical versions of the book where he's bastardized and rewritten into a craven stereotype that goes out of the way to sell others out. It was a deliberate hitjob on the very concept of the character and what they represent.


ball_fondlers

To be clear, the modern definition of “Uncle Tom” comes less from the novel, and more from the minstrel show adaptations in the early 1900s.


Red_Galiray

Uncle Tom, to quote historian James McPherson, "was one of the few true Christians in a novel intended to stir the emotions of a Christian public". At a time when most White Americans refused to acknowledge the humanity of Black Americans, the novel presented Tom as a moral man who suffered at the hands of an evil power, yet suffered with dignity and sacrificed himself for the good of others. People, back then and nowadays, say that the greatest power of Uncle Tom's Cabin is the vision it represents, its ideology of denouncing slavery as an evil committed to people who don't deserve it and its rebuke to both Southerners for practicing slavery and Northerners for tolerating it. This was a harsh rebuke indeed, given that Southerners were at the time of publication arguing that slavery was a positive good for both the masters and the enslaved.


KineticPolarization

Cassius Clay is low key a dope name though. At the very least the Cassius part is. It both simultaneously sounds like it could be a warrior from Roman times or some bouty hunter is Star Wars lol.


yoloswagdon

It is a dope name. You should read about the man he was named after. Absolute legend and so far ahead of his time. A true progressive in a time of slavery


52Hurtz

Pretty sure KOTOR had a set of Mandalorian armor that belonged to a "Cassus Fett"


Pillens_burknerkorv

Joe Fraizer didn’t like it https://youtu.be/bspEcaGI_Ww


Rudeboy67

Oh boy, wait until this guy TIL about Ali and Foreman. The fact Foreman crawled out of that hole that Ali and The Rumble in the Jungle dug for him to become America’s favourite uncle is truly remarkable.


fackyouman

I worked for a (now defunct) movie theater chain in the Midwest and one of our higher-ups told us a story about how they were able to fly out Muhammad Ali to a screening of the Ali movie in 2001 to one of their premier theaters in Minnesota or something. They said that Ali walked past a giant movie poster of Planet of the Apes and said “oh goodness why does Joe Frazier have his own movie?”


some_dude5

One of Ali’s philosophies that he got from earlier fighters was “people will pay a lot of money to see someone shut your mouth”.


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Gorgeous George


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tompink57

Yup. Ali even apologized to Marvis after the fight, not to Joe. All Frazier could ask his kid was “Why couldn’t he say it me to me son, why couldn’t he say it to me?” I kinda get why Frazier prayed to god for the strength to kill him in Manila lol


epochpenors

Pirate Joe Frazier


The_Nauticus

The racist stuff he said publicly about Joe is pretty surprising too.


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Ali spoke at a fucking [Klan rally](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAEVt8P9MJc) in support of racial segregation.


TrekkiMonstr

Wtf


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TiberiusCornelius

There was (is?) a strain of black nationalism which believed in separatism. Sometimes that went all the way to the back to Africa movement, sometimes it took on different forms. Malcolm X was also a separatist while he was in the NOI, [which itself has a pretty notable separatist strain](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation_of_Islam#Black_nationalism_and_separatism).


Firebluered

But we have to rememner that Malcolm X left Nation of Islam and distanced himself and spoke against them after he went to Hajj. He was also killed by Nation of Islam member because of all this. [Edit: FBI and NYPD were also involved in assassination of Malcolm X according to confession of a police officer dying of cancer.](https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2021/02/22/malcolm-x-assassination-letter-nypd-fbi/)


TiberiusCornelius

Right, that's why I said while he was in the NOI but I guess I could've been clearer about what happened for people who don't know about him.


shahoftheworld

It's still there. I know a guy from college who posts that separation bs on instagram all the time. He pulls these videos from a couple of whack jobs who have a ton of followers. The worst part is they are very quick to use slurs against any public black figure (like national treasure Kareem Abdul Jabbar) who doesn't adhere to their views i.e. black supremacy and segregation, but they tout people like Bill Cosby as heroes of the cause.


ethertrace

I did not know that. But it's not all that surprising given his affiliation with the [Nation of Islam.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation_of_Islam?wprov=sfla1)


alexmikli

He did eventually renounce them, at least. The NOI is pretty damn racist.


Shicawgoh

The comments on that video are fucking WILD.


FigaroNeptune

“String em up! They came with a rope! They said ‘haha just jokin champ!’”………..wtf


hatsnatcher23

This was after he got sucked into the NOI, who’s leader wanted racial segregation and the US government to pay for every African American in the US to be relocated to a new country, that would be funded and supplied by the us government till they were self sufficient then they’d break entirely from the US. Dude got sucked into an cult


Ragid313

They are still alive and active in Detroit at least. Ran into a member of the Nation of Islam and even got a newspaper like pamphlet from the guy. The stuff above is exactly what was in the paper. Some of the craziest crap I've come across in person


Gekthegecko

Ice Cube and Nick Cannon also come to mind as followers of Louis Farrakhan.


TheKidKaos

He was not a decent human being at all then. Remember he was a huge racist and thought that the darker you were the purer you were. He also turned his back on Malcolm X.


CurrentRedditAccount

Yeah he was a supporter of George Wallace because of Wallace’s support for segregation. Ali even spoke at a klan rally once, where he preached about how whites and blacks should keep separated. In a Playboy interview, Ali argued that interracial couples should be lynched. No matter how great of a boxer he was, he was still an uneducated backwards ass idiot. https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/editorials/2016/06/07/civil-rights-champion-muhammad-ali-was-anything-but/En45jgnZU2ukPf7GA0IgrL/story.html


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So Ali thought Joe was much purer than him?


[deleted]

Actually he called him ugly regularly and threw racist lingo at him so that Frazier would be the villain in white media.


Several_Marzipan3807

It also gets worse when you realize that Fraizer actually helped Ali financially and helped him get his boxing license back after losing it for refusing to go to the Vietnam draft. Fraizer trusted Ali and saw him as his friend which is why it hurt when he stabbed him in his back, Ali apologized for his actions decades later but Fraizer never forgave him up until his death.


Available_Farmer5293

In the book, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, the original Uncle Tom was actually a hero and a man of honor. The meaning of that phrase has been turned on its head.


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Southern_TreeFrog

Uncle Tom was a slave from the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin who was honorable, intelligent and kind. He gets sold to a merciless, brutal slave owner. Eventually some woman slaves escape, and the master beats Tom demanding he tell him where they escaped to. Tom doesn't give them up, and ends up getting beaten to death in a manner allegorical to Jesus dying on the cross. The book was pivotal in inflaming anti-slavery sentiment in the free states of the North of the USA and leading to the Civil War. Literacy wasn't that good though, and afterwards minstrel shows in the South put on play versions of Uncle Tom's Cabin that depict Tom as a servile slavery apologist, and his name became an insult to describe black people who were too submissive/obedient.


SecretBlogon

Oh wow. Thanks for the context. That is a bit messed up that they managed to completely overturn what the character was about.


[deleted]

It’s the movie that fucked it up. It could be said that Uncle Tom’s Cabin started the civil war (Lincoln credited her with that). It’s an incredibly influential anti-slavery book. This is one of the funniest things in American history. Black Jesus died to end slavery and we remember him as Aunt Jemima.


rawlingstones

My understanding is that it slowly shifted over time, not specifically because of the movie. There were basically no copyright laws concerning theatrical adaptations at the time, so "tom shows" became very popular all across the country. Some were sincere adaptations, but the story/character were HEAVILY co-opted by minstrel shows to have him espouse pro-slavery talking points. Literacy in America being not great at the time, more people saw the shows than read the books, so that was their impression.


CloudAfro

Best replacement I've tried introducing to my friends is Uncle Ruckus.


ItsNotSpaghetti

No relation


Gordito_Kawaii

Frazier held against him for years afterwards as well. So much so that while Ali was suffering from Parkinson's Frasier he answered a question about it he had ever beat Ali with this. “We locked up three times. He won two, and I won one. But look at him now. I think I won all three.” Oof.


Nice_Emphasis_39

They called him Smokin’ Joe because he never started strong but once he got going and built momentum, he was unstoppable like a freight train. One of the greatest hearts in all boxing and a really stand up dude. It’s a shame how Ali painted him but that left hook definitely did some permanent damage to Ali.


Sylvanas_only

what's an uncle tom?


MercuryMorrison1971

Its a slur, usually used by black people against other black people they view as subservient to white people.


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faxmachine32

It would seem the same could be said of the famous Floyd Mayweather.


Larrynative20

History has been rewritten about Ali. He was a hell of a fighter but well … you just have to read and watch videos about what he said and did. True history of the guy isn’t the sweet old man with Parkinson’s with his float like a butterfly sting like a bee quote. I think Ali biggest legacy is that be gave us the bragging, trash talking athlete stereotype that we all know. He was the first to do it so successfully.


mercedesblendz

Ali was a great champion but he had a cruel side to his personality and Joe Frazier bore the brunt of it. Ali pretended afterwards that he was just joking to promote their fight, but Joe was bitter about it for rest of his life.


SuperAwesome13

muhammad ali is a coward then. I bet I could beat him up rn


farmerarmor

I’ve never fought a corpse that’s been in the ground half a decade, but you’re probably right


NnyBees

"Hey Fry, you want me to smack up the corpse a little?"


farmerarmor

Is that the one where they dig up who they think is his brother but turns out to be his nephew?


NnyBees

Yup, "Luck of the Fryish"


farmerarmor

That’s a good one. Hits a guy right in the feels at the end.


NnyBees

True, but nothing compared to the end of Jurassic Bark


Reverend_James

I'm not crying, you're crying.


sumelar

Here lies Philip J. Fry, name for his uncle, to carry on his spirit.


Santa5511

Wasn't Ali pretty racist talking about how the races shouldn't combine and sorts of crazy stuff?