Italian striker Mario Balotelli has slammed hip-hop artist and producer Kanye West for comments he made about slavery.
In an interview with TMZ West said the enslavement of African people was a “choice”.
Balotelli took to Instagram to vent. “What kind of bull***t coming out of your month?” he said on Instagram. “Really? Slavery was by choice? Brother, seriously, who brainwashed you?”
“When you hear about slavery for 400 years … for 400 years? That sounds like a choice,” West told TMZ.
“You was there for 400 years, and it’s all of y’all? It’s like we’re mentally imprisoned.”
West later tweeted a contradictory statement after the backlash.
“Of course, I know that slaves did not get shackled and put on a boat by free will. My point is for us to have stayed in that position even though the numbers were on our side means that we were mentally enslaved.”
