Hate is often seen as being a deep emotion. This depth sometimes alludes to the fact that hate is a deeply held emotion and/or that hate is buried deep within us. Kendrick Lamar's use of the diss tracks counters this common narrative of hate. When it comes to hate, “it ain’t even got to be deep.”
Kendrick refers to himself as, “the biggest hater,” commonly this would refer to a high level of resentment. But for Kendrick, hate is a petty thing and the “biggest hater,” is maximumly petty. Kendrick, when stating that he hates Drake, raps, “I hate the way that you walk, the way that you talk, I hate the way that you dress.” None of this is deep, these are all surface-level complaints, but they are the peak of hatred so much so that Kendrick repeats this line twice.
We like to think of hate as something deep, perhaps to justify our pettiness. But with ‘euphoria’, Kendrick demonstrates the true nature of hate. Kendrick, likely in reference to Radio Raheem’s speech in Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing, contrasts love and hate, whereas in the past he has contrasted love and lust. While for Kendrick love and lust are quite deep emotions, he shows love versus hate as true opposites. Love is the deepest of emotions, while hate is the shallowest of emotions.
Hate is not actually over anything serious, what is seen as hate truly belongs to resentment or envy, to name examples. Yet, hate can leak into the realm of depth, as when Kendrick raps, “I hate when I rap or talk about guns, then somebody die.” This not only shows that the most dangerous form of hate is self, but also that hate can escalate to the point of murderous violence. If you let the petty get to you, you may commit harm, or in other words if you let the hate get to you, you could commit violence.
Still, hate is not just an individual action, as Kendrick points out, “We hate the bitches you fuck.” While hate is personal, a collective can come to share the same petty opinions. Not all members of a collective will hate to the same degree, yet, here the petty gains power. Let us refer back to escalated hate which reaches the point of violence; is this form of hate more dangerous on a purely personal or group level? Group hate, just like purely personal is always shallow. Hatreds based upon race, nationality, sex, disability, and I could on, are ultimately petty. The hater is always looking at something on the surface like how someone walks, talks, or dresses.
This danger only increases because there is a euphoria in hatred. It feels good to hate, it feels good to be petty, “it’s always been about love and hate.” To hate is to also love, in a sense, not just in the sense that opposites necessitate one another, but hate is something to love. Hate can only be appreciated with some form of depth, but since hate is inherently shallow it needs some other emotion to give it depth; this is where love comes in. Hate being fed by love canfurther perpetuate the very pettiness of hate. This not only explains why rap beefs can carry on for so long but also why generational hate can persist.
One can experience a petty euphoria upon finding a target for their hatred. I cannot know for sure why Kendrick titled his Drake diss track ‘euphoria’, there are likely multiple reasons. No matter, this title points to, in part, that Kendrick is enjoying the hate, loving the petty. Perhaps through Kendrick, this is how we can define hate, the love of pettiness. For some, this may weaken the word hate but we might have been giving hate too much power in the first. Then again, I may be the fool in all of this because when it comes to hate, “it ain’t even got to be deep.”
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