Many older Americans are the product of the political system of the 1960s. Protest and protesters were based on real injustices, and the kids were right. The parents of these Archie Bunker “pinkos” were disturbed. One of the primary reasons was, for the first time, ‘I am your father, that’s why—no longer sufficed. As a black American of the 60s, I was a part of the Ali generation. I was raised by my great-grandmother, who grew up as a child in St. Mary’s County, Maryland, and was related to people who not only remembered the enslaved Harriet Tubman but spoke to her. There is a story I have never been able to verify that is a part of my family lore. My great-granny told me her grandfather was forced to help John Wilkes Booth escape Washington, DC—into Virginia after he assassinated President Lincoln.
As much as I revered Muhammad Ali, my great-granny feared his hold on the young black people of America. The man she called “Al-eye” was a threat to the safety of her children, she thought. I grew the biggest afro—I could and unflinchingly looked white people in the eye, which must have unnerved her. She would say Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is a much better role model. Keeping one’s head down and going along to get along was a survival skill of her black experience. A huge swath of white Americans hated the boxer, burgeoning humanitarian and activist. He was smart, outspoken, a Black Muslim, and most of all, he was right. Although Dr. King adamantly spoke against the Vietnam War, Ali was the first to express it with unapologetic anger.
“You my opposer when I want freedom!
You my opposer when I want justice!
You my opposer when I want equality!”
Famously stating:
“Man, I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong. No Viet Cong ever called me ni**ger.”
When Muhammad Ali spoke those words to America, the firestorm was predictable, not because he was wrong but because he gave power to truth. When Rosa Parks refused to stand on a bus, black America stood for her. When former Alabama Gov. George Wallace blocked the doorway of the University of Alabama, others were ready to kick it in.
Having lost friends to the war in Vietnam and protesting the same, it embedded a genuine anti-war bent that has never left me. That is not to say I am a pacifist; I understand war, just not its necessity. In my boomer life, I could separate racism from whiteness and anti-war from anti-America. It is disturbing to see kids with much more exposure to information and tolerance on college campuses willing to justify murder for a cause. There is no nobility in killing children or debasing women, and you do not have to choose sides to say it is all wrong. Jews in America have seen a rise in hate crimes, according to the Anti-Defamation League, 388 percent since Hamas massacred Israelis.
Jews all over are living in fear of existing, and Muslims have lived in fear in America since September 11, 2001. Boomers are blamed for many economic ills and social injustices in American life, but liberal protesting of those ills was consistently moral. It is heartbreaking to see the homes and lives of Palestinians hollowed out by bombs. It was just as horrific and tragic to see citizens of Israel hunted and murdered for sport with some of the visuals provided by GoPro cameras. Chanting “from the river to the sea” has been bastardized by Hamas as not just supporting freedom for the Palestinian people but support for the elimination of Israel. To paraphrase Mr. Ali, no Israeli baby called a member of Hamas a N**ger!
Vote Against Guns
