C
CanadianSteve
Guest
Sorry I'm coming late to the Uncle Tom question. It's pretty much been covered, but I may add a bit. Tom was a hero in the original novel written in pre-Civil War slavery days, but the name came to be an insult referring to a subservient black man in the US in the 60's. You don't hear it so much now.
To bring the Ali-Frazier question into it, here is a quote from Ali's 1975 autobiography The Greatest. It's a part of a conversation between Ali and Joe before their first fight, when Ali was still banned from boxing.
"Ali: I was glad you whipped [Jimmy} Ellis I helped Ellis get everything he got, and he ain't mentioned my name nowhere.
Frazier: Well, that's the kinda guy we called a Tom. Lets everyone talk for him.....I was special glad I whipped 3 guys. Ellis was one. Buster Mathis was another one.
Ali: Buster?
Frazier: He was a singing 'Yes ma'am' type Uncle Tom. Everything he hear the white boss say, you know, he try to repeat it..."
The interesting thing in this is Ali and Joe seemed to be in agreement what an "Uncle Tom" was, and that neither of them were. Later when Ali was publicizing the first fight with Frazier, he tried to paint himself as the black people's champ and Frazier by implication as the white people's fighter. This led to the implication that Frazier was an Uncle Tom, which was very unfair. Ali painted Foreman the same way before their fight, and was even worse to Frazier before their 3rd fight in Manila. This last topic has been dicussed at length on some of the boxing threads. I think Ali did these things as pre-fight hype and got carried away in his characterizations of opponents. Others take a harsher view of Ali's behaviour in this regard, including Frazier himself
To bring the Ali-Frazier question into it, here is a quote from Ali's 1975 autobiography The Greatest. It's a part of a conversation between Ali and Joe before their first fight, when Ali was still banned from boxing.
"Ali: I was glad you whipped [Jimmy} Ellis I helped Ellis get everything he got, and he ain't mentioned my name nowhere.
Frazier: Well, that's the kinda guy we called a Tom. Lets everyone talk for him.....I was special glad I whipped 3 guys. Ellis was one. Buster Mathis was another one.
Ali: Buster?
Frazier: He was a singing 'Yes ma'am' type Uncle Tom. Everything he hear the white boss say, you know, he try to repeat it..."
The interesting thing in this is Ali and Joe seemed to be in agreement what an "Uncle Tom" was, and that neither of them were. Later when Ali was publicizing the first fight with Frazier, he tried to paint himself as the black people's champ and Frazier by implication as the white people's fighter. This led to the implication that Frazier was an Uncle Tom, which was very unfair. Ali painted Foreman the same way before their fight, and was even worse to Frazier before their 3rd fight in Manila. This last topic has been dicussed at length on some of the boxing threads. I think Ali did these things as pre-fight hype and got carried away in his characterizations of opponents. Others take a harsher view of Ali's behaviour in this regard, including Frazier himself
