Monocultured Beef

The Drake and Kendrick feud has united the internet. Will this level of cultural coalescence ever happen again?

The feud between Spotify’s most streamed artist of the 2010s and the only rapper to win a Pulitzer Prize finally boiled over after 11 years of bad blood. Drake and Kendrick Lamar have exchanged steadily escalating bars since March, and everyone you know is talking about it. The feud between two of the most successful musicians of all time is an undeniable monoculture moment. 

There are a lot of ways to identify when society is coalescing around a specific event in pop culture. If you’re equally likely to hear a take on an issue from your grandmother and your fourth grade cousin, it’s probably a monoculture moment. Back in the days of peak Brand Twitter, if Wendy's and Denny’s were posting about an event, it was a monoculture moment.¹ My personal gauge for if something has become monocultural is if I feel comfortable asking coworkers their thoughts on the matter during the awkward small talk at the beginning of a Zoom meeting.

While certain monocultural events are built into the calendar,…