Kanye West’s antics in recent years have made him become more and more difficult to support. Photo by Olivier Douliery/Abaca Press
As I reflect on my time in The Forum, I think about a handful of the articles that I enjoyed writing the most, and the one in particular that gave me the most amount of trouble: “Can You Separate the Art From the Artist.” I rewrote this article multiple times, and eventually I settled on an article that I was proud of at the time. Though in hindsight, I don’t feel I handled the topic with as much intentionality as I could have, and my opinions have become more firm since then.
In my original article, I came to the conclusion that people are obligated to act according to their own moral code, and that they will disregard certain issues to support their favorite people. This was a passive conclusion. Now, I firmly encourage and put the onus on others not to support bad people. But this is a difficult ordeal, because what constitutes a “bad” person? That is where we reserve the right to discretion. I think that if you feel a negative emotion supporting someone’s artwork, creative vision, or even calling them your friend, you should look inward and realize that is not the person you should support.
I’ve felt this way for a while, but I came to this conclusion because of the recent actions of Kanye West. Since being unbanned on Twitter in 2023, West has gone on numerous tirades, spewing bigotry and hate under the pretense of free speech, insulting anyone who criticizes him, and telling audiences they can’t “control him.” Realizing this, I claimed that I would no longer be supporting him because he had fallen off artistically, and as a person. In reality, I only meant I would no longer listen to anything new from him, which I could reason to myself because his products have become increasingly poor in recent years.
But West is someone who I have publicly celebrated, even in The Forum; he was one of my favorite artists, and I still enjoyed listening to his old music. I allowed myself to enjoy his older music until his recent rant on X, where he posted a picture wearing a swastika chain and posted a song supporting Hitler. For me, this crossed a moral line, and I realized I could no longer support him. He had regressed both as a person and as a musician. On top of that, I cannot support other celebrities who I know are bad people.
So to answer my original question, no, you cannot separate the art from the artist. True, great artistry is the product of a person’s soul. The art is channeled through every experience and every belief system that they hold dear. So, no, you cannot separate the art from the artist, and you should never try to.
Now, if we fill our playlists with nothing but good samaritans, that playlist might sound subpar. But it is imperative that we do not give bad people a platform and allow the population to believe poor behavior is the standard.