S13E3 - Dissecting "Worldwide Steppers" by Kendrick Lamar
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From the Ringer Podcast Network, this is Dissect, long-form musical analysis broken into short, digestible episodes. This is episode three of our season-long analysis of Kendrick Lamar's Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers. I'm your host, Cole Kushner.

Last time on Dissect, we examined Mr. Morale's second track, N95, where Kendrick gave a grading evaluation of the current state of the world. He threw shots at cancel culture, materialism, fake friends, fake wokeness, and fake fronting online. He asserted these are simply masks we wear in order to validate ourselves through the eyes of others, a

a grand charade or theater act in service of our ego, as we seek to avoid exposing our imperfections to the world. Having himself admitted to some of these very things on the opening track, United in Grief, we understood that Kendrick was including himself in this diagnosis and that Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers is the journey of one man's decision to remove the performative mask and take a long look in the mirror. Thus, as we move deeper into the album, we keep in mind that Kendrick's journey mirrors our own, as we are united in this human condition.

Kendrick's global diagnosis of dysfunction then continues with the album's third track, the subject of our episode today, Worldwide Steppers. Worldwide Steppers was produced by J Pounds, Soundwave, and Taybeast.

The song begins with narration from rapper Kodak Black, as if he's on a theater stage addressing an audience directly. He introduces three characters: himself, Kendrick's alias OK Lama, and spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle. Kodak's words are punctuated by the rhythmic clattering of shoes on hardwood, the Big Stepper's sonic motif first established on United in Grief. Now despite being just 10 seconds long, there's a lot to address in this introduction, beginning with the presence of narrator Kodak Black.

Within the linear experience of the album, his presence here seems to be an intentional moment of perplexity.

sparking curiosity from some, outrage from others. That's because Kodak has been a controversial figure for some years now, the reasons for which largely stem from a 2016 charge of criminal sexual assault of a high school student when he was 19 years old. It's very likely Kendrick understood that Kodak's presence on the album would cause some controversy, so it's not surprising that he appears directly after N95, a song that ends with Kendrick criticizing cancel culture and claiming not to care about potential critics. What the fuck is cancel culture?

Say what I want about you niggas, I'm like overdose I treat you crackers like I'm Jigga, watch out, own it all

Now because I want to honor the linear experience of Mr. Morales' narrative, we're going to save the major discussion of Kodak Black for our episode on Rich Interlude, the track that's given to Kodak entirely. However, at this moment in the album, our curiosity should be piqued. We should be wondering why Kodak is not only on the album, but why he seems to be playing such a large role. Because he's not just a feature artist, his

His name here is included alongside two definitive main characters in Eckhart Tolle and Kendrick himself. What could Kodak possibly represent in this theatrical play? Now, OK Lama is the alias Kendrick first introduced in August of 2021 when he launched the website OKLama.com. The website contained a letter that gave a brief update on his life and announced that his next album would be his last with TDE. He

He signed this letter, OK LLAMA. Then in May of 2022, about a week prior to Mr. Morales' release, Kendrick dropped The Heart Part 5, the video for which features an introductory title card that reads, I am all of us, a message that is again signed OK LLAMA.

Now, aside from this title card, Kendrick has not said anything publicly about the name, what it means, or why he's adopted it. On a surface level, we can see some similarities with Kendrick's actual name, with "Lama" being just one letter shy of "Lamar", and "K" of course being Kendrick's first name initial. In Tibetan Buddhism, a Lama is a religious teacher, which could align with Kendrick's past proclamations

a prophet. Also, a llama, as in the animal, bears a close resemblance to a goat, which could be a play on the greatest of all time. However, friend of the show Femi Olu-Tade, who co-wrote Dissect Season 5 on DAMN, presented perhaps the most compelling theory about Oke Lama and its possible connection to the Choctaw language. The Choctaw are a North American indigenous tribe that traditionally lived in what is now southeast Mississippi.

Skilled farmers and hunters who lived in a matriarchal society, the Choctaw were named one of the five civilized tribes by European settlers, as they were to some degree willing to assimilate to colonial ways of life, including Christianity. However, the majority of the Choctaw's land was eventually ceded to the United States, and they were forced to move to what is now Oklahoma.

which derives its name from the Choctaw words okla, meaning people or nation, and huma, which when applied to people means brave or honorable. Meanwhile, the word ma in Choctaw is a marker used when addressing someone. In Choctaw translations of the Bible, the two words okla and ma

appear together numerous times when a prophet or poet is addressing God's people on God's behalf. For example, Psalm 78:1, Psalm 81:8, and Psalm 57 all begin with the phrase "um

oklama, which translates to "listen, my people." And so there is a case to be made that Kendrick combined okla and ma into a single word and altered the pronunciation to create his Morale Era moniker, oklama, meaning "my people." Further evidence for this theory comes in the Heart Part 5's introduction. After the "I am all of us" title card, Kendrick or oklama says this just before he starts rapping.

Between All My People and I Am All of Us, it certainly appears Oklama is a unifying moniker meant to reflect the individual's oneness with the whole. Uncoincidentally, this idea of oneness aligns with the central teaching of Eckhart Tolle, who is of course named directly after Oke Lama.

I'm going to resist elaborating on that teaching at this point in the season, as the I am all of us aspect of Tolle's work is what the album ultimately works towards. However, it's worth noting now that Tolle has addressed the idea of changing your name after embarking on a spiritual path. Tolle himself changed his name from Ulrich to Eckhart,

and said that often people feel their birth name carries emotional baggage they wish to unburden themselves from. You adopt a different name and the idea behind it is that you let go of your past completely because the name kind of symbolizes

your entire past, and sometimes even carries an energetic charge to it that comes from the past, all the things that cling to that name. So the idea in many spiritual traditions is as you embark on the spiritual path, you adopt a spiritual name, which you then regard as more real, or it's not ultimately real because it's just another sound,

but more real than your old birth name and definitely it's something that does not have this weight of past to it. Now the final thing I'd like to address in this intro is the order in which the names are recited. We have Kodak Black, Oke Lama, and Eckhart Tolle. It's hard to imagine two people more different than Kodak Black and Eckhart Tolle and Oke Lama is placed between the duality.

If this ordering was intended to have meaning, it's likely that OK Lama represents a conduit through which a Kodak Black and a Neckart Tolle could discover and connect with each other. And Kendrick or OK Lama can function as that conduit because he explicitly embodies the commonalities between them, like the overlapping center of a Venn diagram. This same idea was actually the basis of an advertisement PG Lang created for Cash App called "That's Money".

In it, Kendrick stands between a black man from a place like Compton and a white man named Ray Dalio, creator of Bridgewater, the world's largest hedge fund. The black man, who we might call a big stepper, tells Kendrick a story about playing dice, using so much street slang that it's impossible for someone like Dalio to understand. But Kendrick is there between them to translate, to act as a conduit. Seven, seven, seven, seven, back to back to

Back to back to back. Bro, I was mad he was in, bro. He was all in my bag, in my pockets, in my whole duffy. I was ready to get him. - Basically what he is saying, he saved up his money to get a local barbershop. He then made a friendly business wager with Peanut in hopes to secure more money for his business. But eventually losing it all with one roll of the dice.

After translating, Kendrick asked Dahlia what financial advice he had for the Big Stepper. And Dahlia explains the importance of compounding investments. But Dahlia also communicates in a language that is foreign to the Big Stepper. So Kendrick once again translates. And then when you learn more, you also make more money and it compounds. You could have two barbershops, you could have 10 businesses if you know how to compound.

Basically, bro, what he's saying is slow money wins the race. You can still have a big upside even if you don't throw all your chips in the bag. Invest in yourself. Leave them dice alone. You don't need to invest in the dice. That's going to ruin everything. Spread your money out. Let it build for yourself and work gradually, slowly. Anybody that's ever made a lot of money, they make it fast. You feel me? Feel you. Off top.

With Kendrick's help, the Big Stepper receives financial advice from someone who understands the bigger American hustle of capitalism. Through this exchange, Ray Dalio also understands that the Big Stepper has the same ambitions he does, but is using the tools and language he has access to. In other words, the two find common ground and connection, with Kendrick being a bridge between them.

Kendrick the Gemini embodies aspects of both the street hustler and the Wall Street hustler. He's Kodak and Eckhart, the Big Stepper and Mr. Morale. Or as OK Lama phrased it himself, I am all of us.

I'm a killer, he's a killer, she's a killer bitch. We some killers walking zombies trying to scratch their ditch. Worldwide Steppers' musical foundation is a loop created from a sample of a 1947 song called Breakthrough by the Funkies. Breakthrough by the Funkies

While we don't hear any lyrics from Breakthrough and Worldwide Stepper's sample loop, they're pretty interesting to consider within the context of Mr. Morale as the song is all about breaking free of one's mind. The lyrics read, I'm in an invisible prison. I'm so far in my mind. I gotta break through as not to invade. I gotta break you. It's hopefully in me. I'm going to find a way out of here. I'm in an invisible prison. How can I be free? For

For a child on display, I gotta break through. I had to be free. Of course, it's unclear whether Kendrick or his producers knew of or thought about these lyrics when creating the song, but it's impossible to read them and not connect them directly to the themes of Mr. Morale.

the idea of being trapped in a mental prison, needing to finally break free for the sake of a child. I mean it aligns perfectly. It also correlates directly to the central teaching of Eckhart Tolle, who describes the prison of thought and identity, i.e. the ego, as the fundamental obstruction to spiritual awakening. First, you see the need to be a victim. Identity also, unfortunately, is a form of ego.

Because any conceptual identity is a form of ego. And even though you seem to be amply justified in having a victim identity because of the things that other humans did to you, you yourself are finding yourself in a kind of prison that is created by your mind. So there's no denial that bad things happen to you? Yes. Now the question is:

Again, it's unclear whether the breakthrough sample is intended to carry any thematic weight into Worldwide Steppers or the album more generally. If it is, its lyrical content absolutely fits. If it's a coincidence, then let's consider it a serendipitous layer of depth enjoyed by those of us aware of its presence.

Now over the looping breakthrough sample, Kendrick recites the first half of the song's chorus. "I'm a killer, he's a killer, she's a killer. We some killers, walking zombies, trying to scratch that itch."

Given the all-encompassing scope of humanity implied here, it appears that this is Kendrick's definition of a worldwide stepper, which expands the concept of big steppers established in the previous track N95.

In our last episode, we unpacked a few layers of meaning in the Big Stepper, beginning with the standard slang definition, which refers to individuals who make big moves, who hustle and make money, and who are usually armed when doing so. Kendrick also flips steps to refer to dance steps in the line, serving up a look, dancing in a drought, hello to the Big Steppers, never losing count.

We interpreted this to refer to those who present an image of themselves that is false or misleading. For example, flaunting material goods to project an image of success when really they are living in dire circumstances. It's kind of a dance, a show, a play.

While N95 seemed to specifically take aim at members of Kendrick's immediate community, the title Worldwide Steppers implies this is actually a global epidemic. By Kendrick's definition, we're all killers, all hustling in our own best interest and willing to do harm to others in order to get what we desire. This idea extends into the second line, we some killers, walking zombies, trying to scratch that itch.

Zombies are reanimated corpses who feed on human flesh or brains in order to survive, which on one level seems to be what Kendrick is implying in trying to scratch that itch. The itch being for an actual zombie human flesh. Zombies are also known for how they walk, a slow, exaggerated gait that may add another layer into the stepper's motif.

While zombies are a horror genre trope, they do have a history of being used symbolically in film and literature, representing everything from greed, to the evil in all of us, to the implosion of humanity by its own doing. And certainly, Kendrick is employing this kind of metaphoric use of zombies in his characterization of the Worldwide Steppers, a nation of killers who feed on conflict with each other.

The unalive, unconscious nature of the zombie is also the perfect symbol for another one of Eckhart Tolle's central teachings about the ego. In our last episode, we broadly discussed Tolle's concept of the ego as our complete identification with form, be it physical forms like our bodies or possessions, or mental forms like our thoughts, feelings, or personal history.

We also talked about how the ego is in a perpetual state of seeking validation through its identification with these forms, which provides short-term pleasure but ultimately always leads to suffering or a general feeling of dissatisfaction or unworthiness. Tully often describes living strictly through the ego as a state of unconsciousness, where the ego and its motivations are in full control of your actions.

He also discusses that when the majority of humans are living unconsciously through their ego, it usually always leads to mass suffering and bloodshed. Largely, most of humanity has been trapped in the egoic consciousness for thousands of years. And it has produced what we now know as human history. All these atrocities, these millions upon millions of people killed, they were not killed by psychopaths.

But the number of people killed by criminals and psychopaths is very, very small compared to the number of humans killed by normal humans, normal. And this is why we are now again at a situation where you can see the same unconsciousness arising again in the collective, going in the same direction as before.

It seems clear that the chorus and the concept of worldwide steppers is influenced by Tolle's teachings about the collective unconscious. The idea that the normal egoic state of humanity is one that borders on insanity, that we're living unconsciously like zombies itching for the ego's next fix. As Tolle wrote in his book A New Earth, quote, many people live like sleepwalkers, trapped in old dysfunctional mindsets that continuously recreate the same nightmarish reality.

Kendrick begins verse 1, I am not for the faint of heart. My genetic build can build multi-universes.

As we're already experiencing on Mr. Morale, Kendrick is complicated and his view of the current condition of the world is bleak. Thus, this song, this album, is not for the faint of heart. It's going to be a challenging, somewhat dark experience. Saying his genetic build can build multi-universes might be a nod to his world-building art.

However, given the next line, it could also be a nod to creating his family. He raps: "The man of God playing baby shark with my daughter, watching for sharks outside at the same time. Life as a protective father, a kill for her. My son Enoch is the part two." This passage is a partial description of Mr. Morales' cover art, where Kendrick, the man of God wearing a crown of thorns a la Jesus, holds his daughter Uzi while looking out the window, watching for sharks or zombies.

Tucked in Kendrick's pants is a gun, reflecting his current life as a protective father of two who's willing to kill in order to keep his children safe.

Now we'll talk more about the album cover later this season, but I think what's important to acknowledge here is that this is the first mention of Kendrick's children on the album. And as most fathers would testify, including myself, the protective instinct that comes with fatherhood is very real. And for me it explains so much of Kendrick's immediacy and passion in confronting not only the dangers of the world, but also the dangers within oneself.

Becoming a parent magnifies your flaws, because suddenly the consequences of your actions affect more than yourself. In the face of this magnification, some abandon their children, some pass down their issues to their children, and some do their best to confront and overcome their issues for the sake of their children, and it seems clear that Kendrick chose the latter. In a rare interview given during the Morale Era, Kendrick shared similar sentiments to W Magazine, saying that it was fatherhood that made him question everything the most.

Quote, a lot of times we play with the idea of unconditional love and don't necessarily know if it's real until you feel it.

My children allowed me, in their development as human beings, beginning to walk and talk, to remove my ego." Once again, Kendrick mentions the ego, the lord of all lords, as he'll say later on Mr. Morale. An album that we're discovering is very much about the grueling process of dissolving one's ego. An album about confronting deep-seated issues so they're not passed down to future generations.

And so when Kendrick says "I'd kill for her" there's a literal meaning to that statement, but it's also about killing his own demons and doing what he can to help kill the demonic influences in society. This leads to the next line "When I expire, my children will make higher valleys." Higher valleys is a slight oxymoron, as valleys are low areas of land typically between hills or mountains. Saying "higher valleys" then seems to imply that the lows won't be so low.

Understanding that challenges in life will never be fully eradicated, Kendrick is raising the floor for his children so that their issues won't be as severe or deep as the ones he inherited. Kendrick then continues, In this present moment, I saw that through.

This line makes clear that Kendrick is currently writing during a time after accomplishing his goal of overcoming generational curses, foreshadowing the album's conclusion. However, he's quick to pivot from the present to the past, as he continues to reveal exactly what he had to overcome.

Kendrick continues the verse rapping, Kendrick continues the verse rapping,

This elaborates on what was first established on United in Grief, that Kendrick developed a sex addiction as a way to escape his anxiety and unconfronted trauma. Using the word "lust" here is interesting, particularly when considered with the line about constantly messaging women. It wasn't just the physical act of sex that provided escape. It was also the thrill of pursuing women, the validation sought through women, and as we'll hear in verse 2, the domination of women, all of which feed the insatiable hunger of the ego.

Kendrick telling us to ask Whitney about his lust addiction implies that she would know all about it, that he was habitually cheating on her, and that his actions were not only damaging himself, but the mother of his children, threatening the entire family dynamic. This adds depth to the line, set precedent for a new sacrilegion,

Sacrilege means to violate something considered holy, and so Kendrick's sacrilegion would be a religion founded on such violations. This again implies Kendrick's adultery was habitual, like a religious practice, as he constantly violates two things he considers holy: God and Whitney. It also might refer to Kendrick's role as the "rap savior," as a self-reported messenger of God.

The sacrilegion in this reading would be the hypocritical feelings he may have about not living up to his own standards put forth in his music. More about this possibility in the next lines, starting with "rider's block for two years, nothing moved me."

This helps to further contextualize Kendrick's five-year absence addressed at the top of the album. Now with additional context, we understand the likelihood of Kendrick's personal issues becoming so overwhelming that it contaminated his creativity, creating a blockage that hindered him from channeling God's message. This gets us to the following sequence, "Ask God to speak through me." That's what you're hearing now, the voice of yours truly.

This again seems to be more evidence that Kendrick is writing this specific verse after having completed the emotional transformation documented on the album.

It wasn't until Kendrick confronted his personal issues that he was once again able to channel God's message, and the deeply personal story told in this album is ultimately what God wanted him to write. This sentiment is consistent with the pre-album letter Kendrick published on oklama.com where he stated "Love, loss, and grief have disturbed my comfort zone, but the glimmers of God speak through my music and family."

Kendrick then continues the verse, rapping, teleport out my own body for comfort. I don't pass judgment. Past life regressions keep me in question. Where did I come from?

Past life regression is a form of therapy based on the belief that individuals have lived multiple lives, and that past experiences can influence present behavior and emotions. This therapy often involves hypnosis to access memories and experiences from past lives in order to understand and heal from past traumas or unresolved issues.

While it's not entirely clear, teleport out my own body for comfort is likely referring to such therapy. It's the first of many spiritual practices mentioned in this portion of the verse, as Kendrick attempts to get to the root of his problems. I don't think like I used to. No, I don't blink like I used to. Aqua stares at everybody. See the flesh of man, but still this man compared to nobody. Yesterday I prayed to the flowers and trees. Gratification to the powers that be.

Synchronization with my energy chakras, the ghost of Dr. Sebi. Paid it for it, cleaned out my toxins, bacteria heavy. Sciatica nerve pinch, I don't know how to feel. Like the first time I fucked a white bitch. After noting how his metaphysic exploration has him thinking differently about himself and the world around him, Kendrick describes a few more practices he's been experimenting with. He raps, Yesterday I prayed to the flowers and trees, gratification to the powers that be.

Cultivating gratitude for life and connecting with the divine through nature are practices found in many spiritual traditions. Eckhart Tolle has spoken about using flowers as a conduit for finding stillness, escaping the illusion of self, and connecting to a deeper dimension of consciousness. Just looking at a flower and allow the flower to help you to stop thinking. Acknowledge the silent presence of the flower because it's very silent. The flower is very still.

It's not thinking, it's alive. It's not thinking, it is there in this field of stillness, just is, but alive. So for a minute or two or three, the flower can teach you

to be absolutely in this dimension of stillness. Kendra continues with more spiritual practices, rapping "Synchronization with my energy chakras." Sanskrit for wheels, chakras refer to energy points in your body. They were first mentioned in the ancient sacred texts of spiritual knowledge called the Vedas, which date back from 1500 to 1000 BC. There are believed to be seven main chakras or discs of energy that run down the spine.

These chakras should stay opened or aligned as they correspond to bundles of nerves, major organs, and areas of our energetic body that affect our emotional and physical health. There are many practices that aim to realign one's chakras including yoga, meditation, diet, certain types of bodywork, and music. It appears that Kendrick was doing some form of chakra realignment practice, adding to his growing list of treatments he seems to have been experimenting with on his spiritual journey.

This continues with the mention of the ghost of Dr. Sebi, who helped Kendrick clean out his bacteria-heavy toxins.

Dr. Sebi was a black Honduran herbalist and healer who created a plant-based alkaline diet meant to detoxify the body and achieve an alkaline state that could reduce the risk and effects of disease. Kendrick then refers to experiencing sciatica nerve pinch. The sciatic nerve is the longest nerve in your body. The root starts in your lower back and runs down the back of each leg. Sciatica refers to the sharp pain caused when your sciatic nerve gets compressed or pinched.

There's a number of potential causes of sciatica, but given Kendrick's mention of chakras earlier, we ought to note an interesting connection between sciatica and the second energy chakra called the sacral chakra. The sacral chakra is located between the belly button and above the pubic

bone, and is said to be responsible for creativity, sexual pleasure, and sensuality. Symptoms of an imbalanced or blocked sacral chakra can include sciatica, creative blocks, and overindulgence in hedonistic pleasures like sex, all of which Kendrick has admitted to in this verse. Thus we get the next line, "I don't know how to feel, like the first time I fucked a white bitch." Kendrick's general admission of not knowing how to feel is a pretty potent statement after everything he revealed in this verse.

There's a frenetic energy in his flow, amplified by the pulsing, probing beat, reflecting the urgency of him trying anything and everything to sort himself out, to find some peace of mind, some paradise. A part of this journey includes reflecting back on past experiences and attempting to discover the deeper motivations of his actions. Thus, in verse 2, Kendrick will suddenly travel back in time to analyze his first sexual experience with a white woman. That's right after the break.

Welcome back to Dissect. Before the break, we reach Ward-Wide Stepper's first verse, where Kendrick's emotional confusion in the present reminds him of a similar state of confusion in the past.

Kendrick begins verse 2 the same way he closed verse 1. The first time I fucked a white bitch.

The language here is obviously very crude, and I believe purposefully so, as Kendrick's using language to foreshadow the crude, objectifying motivations behind his sexual experience. We then get more details. I was 16 at the Palisades, fumbling my grades, traveling with the team, the Apache life, Centennial was like. Kendrick describes traveling with his high school sports team, the Centennial Apaches, to the Pacific Palisades, a wealthy white neighborhood about 30 miles away from Kendrick's hometown of Compton.

Within this sports team motif, we recognize fumbling as a football term and traveled as a basketball term. Both of them are penalties, which Kendrick uses to describe his failing grades. He then continues, Centennial was like when Miss Baker screamed at Doughboy, mixed that with purple rain. They interchanged the scenes, happy just to be out the hood with all the wealthy kids. Kendrick uses references to two films to illustrate this integration of poor black kids from Compton and wealthy white kids from Palisades.

The first is Boys in the Hood, which takes place in South Central LA and centers the experiences of three boys attempting to navigate life in their violent, poverty-stricken neighborhood. Specifically, Kendrick cites Mrs. Baker, aka Brenda, who constantly berates her son Doughboy, a gang member played by Ice Cube. Mrs. Baker favors her other son Ricky, who is a star high school football player hoping to escape the hood with a college scholarship, which continues the high school sports motif of the verse.

Meanwhile, Purple Rain is a movie starring Prince, who plays a talented but troubled musician named The Boy, who is attempting to escape his abusive father through musical stardom. It would appear Kendrick is referencing these films as a composite of his own story, as well as the stories of other Compton teens he grew up with.

Some have aspirations of escape through sports and entertainment like the boy, Ricky, and Kendrick. Others fall victim to gang life like Doughboy. However, there's wordplay in this passage too, as Kendrick's phrasings of, mix that with purple rain, seems to be a play on the fact that purple is a mix of red and blue, the colors of the bloods and crips, formerly linking the Boys in the Hood Compton references. Also, according to Prince himself, the image of a purple rain is meant to symbolize hope in a dark time. Quote,

When there's blood in the sky, red and blue equal purple. Purple rain pertains to the end of the world and being with the one you love and letting your faith in God guide you through the purple rain, unquote.

If Kendrick were intentionally playing off this symbolism, it would connect with the idea of teens from the hood attempting to escape their dark circumstances. And for Kendrick, that trip to the Palisades offered a glimpse at such an escape. Hence the line, happy just to be out the hood with all the wealthy kids, credit cards and family plans. She drove her daddy's bins.

Kendrick reveals that the white girl was one such wealthy kid in Palisades. However, as Kendrick reveals next, there was another detail that adds a deep layer of significance to their sexual encounter.

Kendrick continues describing his sexual encounter with the white high schooler, rapping, Throughout his discography, Kendrick has been transparent about his family's involvement with potential criminal activity.

While Uncle Perry was never mentioned by name in his music until now, Kendrick did include him in a tweet he made back in 2014, where he lists 15 individuals he knows that are incarcerated. It turns out that Kendrick had coincidentally met the wealthy white daughter of the sheriff who sent his Uncle Perry to prison, and describes having sex with her as a "win-win", meaning that sex with her was not only pleasurable physically, it was also pleasurable psychologically.

as Kendrick felt a twisted satisfaction in sexually dominating the kin of the man who imprisoned his relative. He describes this as "paying her daddy's sins," implying that Kendrick felt he was a tool for karmic revenge.

This adds substantial weight to the following line when he raps "Next time I fucked a white bitch." Having now revealed the context and motivations behind these sexual encounters, the crude phrasing here makes sense, as it describes the acts in a way that reflects the crude motivations behind them. He then explores this complex dynamic more deeply in the verse's closing lines. He reveals that the second time he had sex with a white woman was on the Good Kid, Mad City tour, the same tour in which Kendrick had sex with the green-eyed model he described on United in Grief.

Returning once again to this time period, when Kendrick first found international success, might indicate that this was the genesis of his lust addiction, as he coped with the pressures of fame and the loss of loved ones by indulging in the temptations fame now afforded him. Kendrick then mentions Whitney again, likely implying that his indulgence occurred while they were still together. He raps, "'Whitney asked did I have a problem. I said, I might be racist.'

"Ancestors watching me fuck" was like retaliation. Kendrick reveals he might hold deep-seated resentment against white people for the torture they imposed on his black ancestors, evoking American slavery and the centuries of subsequent oppression black people have faced in this country. Thus, Kendrick as a black man conquering a white woman is another win-win. It's a crude revenge fuck not just for his family or immediate community of Compton, but his entire race.

However, the dynamic between Whitney's question and Kendrick's response here is worth exploring. In the song's first verse, Kendrick more or less confesses to having a sex addiction. But as we discussed earlier, that confession was written from a present perspective. He then takes us back in time to describe a few specific sexual events to color that lust addiction. And thus, we might assume Whitney's question here was asked during that same time period. This

This helps us understand the nuance of Kendrick's writing here. Just as the crude phrasing "fucked a white bitch" reveals Kendrick's crude objectification of these women, Kendrick's response to Whitney during the same time period reveals that he wasn't fully ready to admit he had a problem. Instead, he dodges the question and rationalizes his actions with righteous indignation.

It doesn't mean that there isn't truth in the vengeance he felt sexually conquering these white women, nor does it negate the possibility that those feelings are linked to a subconscious resentment passed down through the generations since slavery. But that layer is just rationalization until Kendrick admits to himself he has a problem, which he'll eventually do by the end of the album.

And so narratively, Kendrick appears to be walking us through the layers of his psyche at different stages in his life in order to share his mentality and motivations during those stages.

With this second repetition of the chorus, we hear the second half that was cut off in the song's intro. Kendrick raps: "Germaphobic, hetero and homophobic, photoshopping lies and motives, hide your eyes then pose for the pic."

Germophobia is an extreme fear of germs and obsession with cleanliness. Kendrick is likely using the term metaphorically here, describing the ways our fear of each other motivates our killing of each other, just as a germophobe obsessively kills potential germs. This fear of others is encompassed in hetero and homophobic, which again feels more symbolic than it does a literal reference to sexuality.

Because if we're all killers living unconsciously, then our fear of others is much deeper than discrimination. We see everyone as a potential threat, heteros and homos alike. The analogies continue with photoshopping lies and motives.

Photoshop is Adobe's photography editing software, and like the phrase "Googled it", it's now used as a transitive verb to refer to the practice of altering a photo before posting it on social media. But Kendrick implies the alteration of reality goes much deeper than selfies. We can also Photoshop our motivations, the true intention behind our actions.

Kendrick being as honest as possible about his sex with white women was an attempt to reveal his true motivations, even when that truth makes him look bad or ugly or imperfect. After all, he was weaponizing sex. He took pleasure in dominating women. In this way, Kendrick is admitting to being a killer, as the chorus says. He's being as transparent as possible. He's removing the mask, the veneer, the polish of Photoshop. This leads to "Hide your eyes, then pose for the pic."

Kendrick seems to be playing on the traditional symbolism of our eyes being the windows to our soul, who we truly are. So concealing your eyes metaphorically and posing for a picture is to conceal your true self in order to uphold the constructed image of yourself, the role you have adopted for yourself, the way you want to be seen in the eyes of others, all of which are extensions of the unconscious ego.

And now we got the technology of Facebook where you can externalize the image and you can create on the Facebook page, you can create the image of me and show it to the whole world. And it is often used unconsciously in enhancing the image one has of oneself and the image one wants to show to the world.

And then you read other people's images on their Facebook page and you think that's who they are. And then you try to compete with that image and you try to polish up your image and compete with them. So you can, in many cases, it becomes an artificial construct that you add to every day and everybody else has their artificial construct.

And it can actually strengthen the delusion of the false self. As Tolle proposes here, social media is not necessarily the problem, or rather is not the root of the problem. It's a symptom of the human ego, which produces dysfunction when left unchecked, when we live unconsciously. But perhaps Kendrick has chosen social media as one of the album's central targets of critique,

because it's one of the easiest entry points into understanding the deeper fallacy of the ego. Just like the PG Lang advertisement, Kendrick seems to be speaking a language his audience will understand in order to communicate the larger principles of Tolle's work, to act as a bridge for the worldwide steppers.

Worldwide Steppers continues with a beat switch as the song suddenly cuts to a sample loop of 1976's Look Up, Look Down by Soft Touch.

This more traditional hip-hop loop creates a brief respite from the pulsating intensity of the main beat. However, because it drops in and out so quickly, the quote-unquote "respite" actually ends up just contributing to the overall chaos of the track.

With verse 1 and verse 2 focusing primarily on the ways Kendrick himself has been a killer through his objectification of women, he turns his focus on the external world, elaborating on the song's premise. He raps: "8 billion people on earth, silent murderers, non-profits, preachers and church, crooks and burglars."

Kendrick immediately targets what are typically considered forces of good: religious institutions and non-profit organizations. In theory, these are institutions that raise money for charitable causes, offer services to the needy, or lead others to live a moral and spiritual life in service of God.

However, human history provides endless examples of corruption and dysfunction within these same institutions. Millions of humans have been slaughtered in the name of religious ideology, thousands of children have been molested by leaders within their own church, and there's an overwhelming number of examples of financial corruption within non-profit organizations.

What I think Kendrick is forcing us to do is really consider why these organizations for "good" have such a history of corruption. And within the context of the song's central premise, his likely answer points to the fact that these organizations are still operated by individuals, by imperfect human beings, and every human being is susceptible to internal corruption.

no matter how good or humanitarian the role you adopt for yourself is. Because every human being has the potential for wickedness. Every human being is a potential killer, even the ones who adopt roles of service. Because adopting a role of good does not make you a good person, just as a social media post does not make you an activist.

It is still the responsibility of the actor to live up their adopted role. Beneath the theatrical mask is still an imperfect human being, vulnerable to any number of transgressions. Kendrick then moves his attention to education, rapping, Hollywood, corporate, and school, teachin' philosophies. You're either gonna be dead or in jail. Killer psychology.

The phrase "dead or in jail" is typically used to reference the disproportionate statistical probability of black American men ending up dead or in jail by the age of 25. Kendrick seems to be pointing to Hollywood and the education system's contribution to this predetermined destiny, which he says breeds a killer psychology. In his piece "Dead or in Jail: The Burden of Being Black in America", writer Wilbur L. Cooper wrote about the psychological effects of being told from a young age that he was at a high risk of being murdered or imprisoned.

But even if we manage to avoid the death or jail cell quagmire my father warned me about, there's still the plantation in our minds to contend with. The terror we live under today may not be comparable to that of the 1860s, but the fear, the humiliation, and the emasculation remain in subversive and subtle forms, creeping in and crippling us from the inside.

Of course, not every altercation between the police and black youth ends in death, but the indignities we endure every day take a different kind of toll. They chip away at our personhood, our humanity, and can very easily make us meek, or else a uniquely American breed of monster. This sentiment feels aligned with Kendrick's killer psychology, which he then expounds on in the following lines, Silent murderer was your body count, who your sponsorship.

Silent Murderer formally articulates the concept Kendrick is building in this third verse, which are the subtle ways we quote-unquote kill or harm each other every day, often unconsciously.

Asking who your sponsorship likely questions who is funding your killings, implying that many people get paid to kill if one's job or career contributes to the dysfunction of the world. What's your body count in this context is a question about how many people you've killed. But body count is also used to denote how many people you've slept with, which Kendrick uses to pivot to his own killings, rapping "Objectified so many bitches I killed their confidence."

Kendrick here formally links his sex addiction to a kind of killing. He was objectifying women, reducing them to mere physical vehicles for his own selfish sexual pleasure and escape.

He posits that by doing this, he has contributed to killing women's confidence, a claim that has research to support it. In a comprehensive study conducted for Nature Reviews Psychology, they found that the widespread sexual objectification of women unsurprisingly had negative effects. The most central being something called self-objectification, where women come to see themselves as a physical object first and a human being second.

As a result, these women tie their self-worth to their physical appearance, develop unrealistic expectations, and become overly critical of their bodies. Or, in Kendrick's words, it kills their confidence.

And so, within the song's central analogy, Kendrick is confessing to murder. His behavior directly contributes to society's denigration of women. At the same time, we also know that Kendrick's sexual addiction is a manifestation of his own unconfronted trauma and grief, which was itself caused by humans harming other humans.

And so we recognize the behavioral cycle Kendrick is illuminating, where the killing of one causes the killing of another. Where hurt people hurt people and an endless cycle of egoic unconsciousness. The media is the new religion. You killed the consciousness. Your jealousy is way too pretentious. You killed accomplishments. Niggas kill freedom of speech. Everyone's sensitive. If your opinion fuck around and leak...

Might as well send your will. The industry has killed the creators. I'd be the first to say to each exec, I'm saving your children. We can't negotiate. I caught a couple bodies. During this section of the verse, a new sample is introduced. A man saying, what the fuck? This sample comes from a 2019 viral skit by the comedian Rodel Ortiz, who is upset by the lack of cheese at a cookout. Hey yo, what the fuck? There's no cheese?

Devoid of its original context, Ortiz's comedic frustration is made sincere in Worldwide Steppers, as Kendrick seems to use it to express his own astonishment about the world around him. He raps, In our last episode, we talked about the decline of traditional religion, and the ways in which things like capitalism could be viewed as filling that void in contemporary society. A similar case could be made regarding the media, particularly social media.

which comes complete with its own daily rituals, doctrines, and apostles or influencers. Kendrick claims a religious-like adoption of social media has "killed the consciousness," which presents a few potential interpretations depending on how consciousness is defined. Traditionally, conscious is used to mean thoughtful, being actively aware of and thinking about one's environment.

This would certainly apply to Kendrick's critique of social media, which by nature de-emphasizes critical thought and its prioritization of quick, short-form dopamine hits that comprise a social media feed, a feed we scroll religiously every day. However, consciousness is also one of the fundamental principles of Eckhart Tolle's work,

who uses consciousness or presence to define the inner spaciousness within every human being, which he proposes as our true essence and connects us not only to each other but the divine essence of the universe. This consciousness is what dissolves our identification with the ego and its access through stillness or awareness, which is of course the antithesis of the immersive stimulus of social media.

Then you have other things that continuously stimulate the minds that almost designed for you not to become still. It's like the civilization has made a great effort to come up with as many things as possible to prevent people from becoming still and spacious. Taking a moment of looking at the sky and feeling the inner,

spaciousness arise,

Kendrick continues the verse, your jealousy is way too pretentious. You killed accomplishments. Comparison is the ego's favorite game to play. And when the ego feels threatened by someone else's accomplishment, it usually finds a way to undermine it. Social media has made this phenomenon even more transparent. Read the comments of any positive post and you're bound to find cynics undermining the positivity. Kendrick then raps, n-words killed freedom of speech. Everyone's sensitive. If your opinion fuck around and leak, might as well send your will.

As we discussed last episode, one of the common critiques of cancel culture is that it threatens free speech and creates an environment of fear. Thus, Kendrick posits that if we actually told the truth, we're at risk of being killed, so to speak. Fearing judgment and seeking validation from others, this dynamic encourages the photoshopping of motives, encourages us to censor certain parts of ourselves in order to avoid judgment.

Kendrick continues this thread in the next line: "The industry has killed the creators. I'll be the first to say. To each exec, I'm saving your children. We can't negotiate." It appears Kendrick feels the creative industry has stopped supporting work that may oppose consensus out of fear of online backlash.

helping to perpetuate a closed cycle of Orwellian groupthink. However, N95 made clear Kendrick intends to say exactly what he feels on this album, and he views this act of free expression as a moral one, one that will help preserve pure, uncensored expression for future generations. I caught a couple bodies myself, slid my community My last Christmas toy driving Compton handed out eulogies Not because the rags in the park had red gradient

As the third verse works towards its conclusion, Kendrick pivots to himself again, admitting another act of killing. He raps about catching a couple bodies at the annual TDE Christmas toy drive in Compton. It's an intentionally contradictory scenario, as we wonder how such a charitable cause could be problematic.

He then explains, not because the rags in the park had red gradient, but because the high blood pressure flooded the catering. There's some clever wordplay here. Red colored rag signifies that blood gang members were in attendance, which could cause tension or high blood pressure because of the potential for violence.

However, Kendrick makes clear that it was actually the unhealthy foods served at the toy drive that did the most damage, as a poor diet is one of the biggest contributors to high blood pressure, also known as hypertension. He's likely alluding to the fact that hypertension is the leading cause of death in America, and that African Americans are statistically more prone to hypertension than any other racial group. And so while a toy drive itself is a great cause, even this act of charity came with some level of unconscious killing.

While it seems like a trivial detail to critique a single meal, I think that's kind of the point.

Kendrick is pointing out how easily charitable acts can be corrupted, and perhaps more importantly, how easy it would be for him to feel good about himself for doing a charitable act while ignoring that he contributed to the deadliest health condition in America. Because acknowledging this complicates that good feeling, and therefore forces you to question your own motives. Are you doing the charitable acts because they make you feel like a good person, or look like a good person?

He then uses this example to transition into the verse's final sequence. Kendrick once again demands us to confront our own participation.

He raps, what's the difference between your life when hiding motives? More fatalities and reality bring you closure. The noble person that goes to work and pray like they're supposed to slaughter people too. Your murder's just a bit slower.

Kendrick here closes in on what I believe is the verse's central point, which is calling into question the true motives behind our actions, particularly those who see themselves as a good person. Because believing yourself to be noble or good is simply a narrative that you created for yourself, it's just another role you play, a mask you put on. You see yourself as the doer of good and you see yourself as sacrificing something that you give to another.

So it improves your ego really, how you see yourself, because what is ego but an inner self reflection. Ego is like an inner mirror where you are not yourself, you have an image of yourself and you live through this mental image of yourself. And the image of yourself is usually not satisfying.

So every ego tries to improve the image of oneself and it can do it in many, many different ways. But then you have the image of me, the doer of the good deed, and that really strengthens the image.

As Tolle alludes to here, if you're not conscious of your true motivations, the ego will use the image of a good person as a way of comparative superiority. And as Kendrick has pointed out multiple times, that's where things get problematic. When goodness is weaponized and used as a justification for passing judgment, for treating people horribly in big and small ways. At its most extreme, a so-called good cause has been used to justify killing millions.

Through the lens of Tolle's work, dysfunction that grows from good intentions is the result of the ego. When serving the ego, no act of kindness is wholly pure.

That doesn't mean the kind thing is always wrong or isn't helpful. I think Kendrick is just asking us to be real about our motives, to scrutinize our actions beyond the delusional, self-serving narrative the ego constructs for us. If we do this, we come to understand that no one is morally perfect, that each of us has the potential to kill. Therefore, no one has the right to judge the big stepper when we are all steppers in the end.

I'm a killer, he's a killer, she's a killer bitch. We some killers walking zombies trying to scratch that itch. Dramaphobic, hetero and homophobic, photoshopping lies and models. Hide your eyes, think poems for the pic. Conclusions.

Worldwide Steppers continues Kendrick's deconstruction of himself and the world around him. He documents his many spiritual experiments on his journey of healing before exposing some of the darker motivations behind his objectifying sex with women. After revealing how ugly some of his own motives are, Kendrick then turns the mirror on us, prodding us to really consider our own motivations, our own ugliness, our own capacity for killing, down to the smallest of details.

To deny your own selfishness, your own capacity for harm, your own imperfection, is a fantasy of the ego's selective view of self.

Kendrick once again uses the fabricated, photoshopped quality of social media to symbolize our tendency to conceal these ugly, selfish, egoic motivations. And some of us are playing the part so well, we've convinced ourselves that that's who we really are. We see ourselves as a good person. And I think Kendrick is telling us it's not that simple. We're all made of the same human ingredients. All come from the same source.

all variations of the same imperfect color. This is why the song is titled Worldwide Steppers and not Big Steppers like the album title. Kendrick is driving home the fact that none of us are exempt. However, as Mr. Morales' next song makes clear, if we're all killers, if we all have the potential for corruption, then the opposite must be true as well. That every killer, every stepper, has the potential for moral virtue and spiritual redemption. I hope I'm not too late

Of course, this is Mr. Morales' next track, Die Hard. A song we'll examine note by note, line by line, next time on Dissect.

If you enjoyed today's episode, please tell a friend about the new season or share on social media. It really helps. Also, you can support the show by purchasing our new Season 13 merchandise, available now at dissectpodcast.com. All right. Thanks, everyone. Talk to you next week.