Pizza is a spicy topic. There are all different kinds, but everyone is willing to defend their preferences to death. Here’s my hot take: barbecue chicken pizza is not pizza.

The U.S. is no stranger to the pizza phenomenon. PMQ Pizza Magazine reported in 2018 that the United States spent $45.1 billion on pizza sales. In the U.S., your allegiance to your pizza preferences is as American as a New York slice, Chicago-style deep-dish, Philly tomato pie, or California-style. But there is one type of pizza that I just cannot condone and that is barbecue chicken pizza.

Here are some of my grievances against said pizza: barbecue sauce replaces classic tomato sauce, huge chunks of barbecue-smeared chicken are strewn across the pizza, and any type of vegetable that may top the pizza seems thrown on as more of a garnish and an afterthought than to have any sort of nutritional purpose.

I can understand the validity of a simple pepperoni and have even tried some of the bougie pear and brie slices. But barbecue chicken pizza just should not be. If you want that much barbecue sauce, just go to Wingstop or Buffalo Wild Wings. To me, barbecue chicken pizza seems like one of those things where people decided to combine two great individual foods, chicken wings and pizza, in the belief that it would form an even more amazing food. But I find that that is simply not so.

In an effort to create an even better meal, they have destroyed what was great about the two individually. Personally, I think pizza’s greatness comes from the variety of ingredients and flavors but barbecue’s harsh flavors impede one’s ability to experience any of the elements that make pizza great. The overwhelming quality of barbecue sauce makes every other element of the pizza secondary.

I’m also not a fan of the huge pieces of chicken that litter the pizza. While I do like chicken, the large pieces of chicken can prove to be formidable when trying to down a slice and may prove more effort than it’s worth.

To finish off this douchebag of a pizza, while carnivores may be enticed by this, the cilantro garnish and shreds of red onion are a slap in the face. The pizza is heavy on the barbecue sauce and light on the ingredients. While I don’t mind a simple slice of pizza, the numerous ingredients are what usually lend themselves to the myriad flavors.

I’m all for an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink type of pizza, and personally believe that there is nothing better than Odyssey Pizza’s Montara Mountain pizza which is laden with ingredients like a Thanksgiving cornucopia. I can also get behind a simple pepperoni pizza, vegetarian pizza, or a high-end piece that should be paired with a specific beer or wine. But barbecue chicken pizza will forever be blacklisted in my mind.