All that being said, it's not only hard to take Kanye seriously these days, it's also hard to support him. His comments in an interview with TMZ that 400 years of slavery were "a choice" have been condemned by pretty much everyone (with the unfortunate exception of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones ), and for good reason. It was an incredibly damaging and offensive statement to make. Sure, some people have posited that this whole thing is just elaborate performance art (we hope so!), but unless there's serious truth to that explanation, our feelings towards Kanye right now are complicated to say the least.