About

Measurehead is a character in the 2019 role-playing video game Disco Elysium who is a race supremacist and a firm believer of race theory. Online, the character appeared in multiple memes following the game's release, most notably in speech bubble edits in which he is paired with racially charged commentary.

Origin

On October 15th, 2019, RPG Disco Elysium was released. During day one of the game, the player is able to encounter Measurehead (real name Jean-Luc), a towering, muscular and heavily tattoed man affiliated with the Dockworker's Union.^[1] Measurehead is standing guard to one of the areas of the game.

In his dialogue, Measurehead speaks about his beliefs in the supremacy of the Semanese people, referring to the people of the Occident as "ham sandwiches" or by their haplogroup (seen below). During his dialogue, he comments that the protagonist Harry Du Bois' body betrays his degeneracy, and makes multiple remarks on race and racism. Speaking to Measurehead unlocks Advanced Race Theory, one of the available "thoughts" in the game.

Your body betrays your degeneracy.

The name of the character is a reference to phrenology, a pseudoscience involving measuring the shape of one's head to predict mental abilities.

Spread

Starting in 2019, Measurehead has appeared in various memes, particularly memes about racism. On December 10, 2019, Redditor AlexanderTheGreatly posted one of the earliest memes featuring the character, an Attention Moviegoers / Mixed Race Couple meme that received over 230 upvotes in the /r/DiscoElysium^[2] subreddit in four years (shown below, left).

In June 2020, during the viral popularity of the Lev Punch format, an edit of Measurehead punching Harry Du Bois saw viral spread online^[3] (shown below, right).

Notably, Measurehead achieved particular virality as a character in speech bubbling memes, being used on X / Twitter, Reddit and other sites to quote posts containing racial remarks, especially elaborate and esoteric.

For example, on September 4th, 2022, X^[4] user @MalaisePosting paired Measurehead's portrait with a since-removed post made by user @carcassofalion in which he referred to a Dutch person as "Yakubian ape." The post (shown below, left) received over 110 likes, with a similar Reddit post gaining over 550 upvotes in the /r/DiscoElysium^[5] subreddit.

More memes featuring the character went viral in 2023 and 2024.

Various Examples

Template

Search Interest

External References