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First I’ll say that I really like the album a lot regardless of my critique. I still think Kendrick is arguably the greatest rapper of all time, but that doesn’t mean his social commentary always hits the mark, and that’s what I’m gonna focus on here. I don’t think he has some nefarious agenda or anything either, I believe he always had the best intentions, but had unfair expectations of what he could accomplish with the message in his art to achieve social change, which eventually led him down this path of a highly individualist COPE of his own perceived failure in bettering society.

There are some songs on the album where through deeply reflecting on his own personal experiences he actually did come to some great insights and points of social commentary, songs like Father Time, Mother I Sober and Auntie Diaries are great examples of that. Without explicitly naming those terms, he discusses things like patriarchy, colonialism, sexual violence etc. in a thoughtful and accessible way. But it’s when he zooms out of his own personal experiences and looks at SOCIETY from a distance and his own role in (not) bettering society where he gets lost in the ideological illusions of idealism, individualism and a great man theory of history. I promise I’m not tryna over intellectualize s*** and I will try to explain what I mean with as much clarity as I can.

After my first couple of listens of the album I realized Kendrick probably has one of the most interesting character arcs outlined in his discography. The shift from Section.80 to this album isn’t lost on anybody, including Kendrick himself. The change from “we gon be alright” to “I chose me I’m sorry” is a pretty dramatic shift, but it’s in my opinion an unnecessary shift that ultimately stems from how he misunderstood the problems that he addressed in his music throughout his career.

I think if you want to pinpoint where exactly this shift happened the most, there are two important moments, firstly the period in between TPAB and DAMN. and the 2020 BLM protests. Kendrick told us many times on this album that he is NOT our savior, but he had to convince himself of that before he told us that, in Mortal Man where he finishes the poem throughout TPAB, he said:

“A war that was based on apartheid and discrimination
Made me wanna go back to the city and tell the homies what I learned
The word was respect
Just because you wore a different gang color than mine's
Doesn't mean I can't respect you as a black man
Forgetting all the pain and hurt we caused each other in these streets
If I respect you, we unify and stop the enemy from killing us
But I don't know, I'm no mortal man
Maybe I'm just another nigga”

From his perceived failure he found out that he was not a savior and in fact just another nigga. That reality check took a lot of the hope out of him, and I do sympathize with it, but it was because of an unfounded expectation based on a false conception of how social change is achieved. Namely through the propagation of certain ideas, and that a positive message spreading to individuals could bring about a positive change in society, if only it was that simple… This is what I mean with idealism. In reality it’s not the ideas of the people that need to be changed in order to prevent violence in impoverished communities, it’s the material conditions that need to change in order to take away the conditions that lead to that violence.

But Kendrick thought he could make a change by spreading his idea of unity, being confronted with that failure was hard for him to take, and I think that’s why DAMN. had such a depressing tone throughout the album, especially with songs like YAH, FEEL and LUST. He also started to find the responsibility he felt to change the world overwhelming, but he wasn’t quite abandoning the responsibility altogether. “I feel like the whole world want me to pray for em, but who the f*** praying for me? ” is still not quite the same as “I chose me I’m sorry ”

I think that was partly because of the 2020 BLM protests and how he got criticized for not doing enough, especially by Noname. That last verse on Mirror where he went “I chose me I’m sorry” in the hook was directed at her:

“'Cause all of it's toxic
Girl, I'm not relevant to givin' on profit
Personal gain off my pain, it's nonsense
Darlin', my demons is off the leash for a moshpit
Baby, I just had a baby, you know she need me
Workin' on myself, the counselin' is not easy
Don't you point a finger, just to point a finger
'Cause critical thinkin' is a deal-breaker
Faith in one man is a ship sinking
Do yourself a favor and get a mirror that mirror grievance
Then point it at me so the reflection can mirror freedom
She told me that she need me the most, I didn't believe her
She even called me names on the post, the world can see it
Jokes and gaslightin'
Mad at me 'cause she didn't get my vote, she say I'm triflin'
Disregardin' the way that I cope with my own vices
Maybe it's time to break it off
Run away from the culture to follow my heart”

I actually mostly agree with what he’s saying here because I think the way noname went at Kendrick was completely out of pocket and that it was based on a false idea of Kendrick being a “savior”. But he gotta realize that he himself played a role in that as well. I would have liked to see him reflect more on his own responsibility in that, instead of just pointing the finger at those who may have unfairly deemed him to be some kind of failure without addressing how that happened. This is the problem with how he conceived of social change by a misconception that great men throughout history are the ones who spur social change, which explains his idolization of 2pac, to whom he pretty obviously saw himself as the next great man with the task of changing society for the better, or in other words, as a savior.

The part that I take issue with is that he acts as if he had to choose between either being a savior, or just only being concerned with his own problems, as he said in Mirror: “Sorry I didn't save the world, my friend, I was too busy building mine again”. But here Kendrick presents us a false dichotomy, either be a savior, or just concern yourself with your own problems, since you cannot save the world anyway, there is a different option that Kendrick is omitting, you don’t have to choose between either extremes, but I think that’s because he was previously so invested in the other extreme. So I understand where he’s coming from, but I don’t think this is the right position to take, but who knows where his head will be at in a couple of years. I look forward to finding that out with his next album and until then I’ll be bumping Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers

TLDR: I can definitely sympathize with Kendrick’s feeling of disappointment in not achieving what he genuinely wanted to achieve with the message in his music, but it was ultimately based on his misconception of the problems that he wanted to solve because of his understanding of history mostly being determined by great men (or as he says, “saviors”) propagating ideas that changed material conditions. When confronted with his own inevitable failure as one of those great men, he instead went to the other extreme and distanced himself from being concerned with the world's problems altogether and embraced a highly individualistic mindset in just worrying about “building his own world” instead, but those are of course not the only choices.

@frenchpress @DonutHole @JJThaJuiceman @Vox @RedEyeJedi @SegaDreamFlash @Vox @Beach_kneega @gabapentin @krishna_bound

ok

when?

🤔

Okay first off, youre throwing too many big words at me. Because I don't understand them, imma take it as disrespect. Watch your mouth @op

No avy

you know damn well what kinda response you're gonna get posting an essay in music sxn gimme a bit to read over and then ill respond w/ thoughts

Spot on

Preciate the write up dawg

Gonna get back with thoughts in a while

makes sense

That's right I'm in it
Let's see

I know lol but some ppl in the album thread wanted me to @ them with me articulating my full thoughts

Haters can suck my d*** like that white girl did to kendrick in copenhagen

good thread

He just realised what you haven’t

@kendrick

Hateful like sme girl at the end of we cry together

Great write up.

This is dope but also mad disappointing to think about.

Like it's CRAZY the things rappers respond to versus what they let slide bro. Niggas will call you out your name, French was selling wolf tickets about this nigga for mad long and no smoke for him but it was for a woman that made a tweet that didn't actually say names and has now honestly...her point was proven right.

@AmoryBlain

Steak cooked mamba

Literally, and i cannot stress this enough, LITERALLY the opposite i love steak

I feel like a lot of artists overestimate the role of art in social change because it's the main way they engage with the world, TPAB was an incredible album but it's not like it really changed the world in a meaningful way

Nah but I actually agree. He sized himself up as the leader of a revolution since Section 80 and now he's confused why mfs looking at him as a savior ?