Two Buff Men Beating up A Rectangle / YouTube vs. Ad Blocker

About

Two Buff Men Beating up A Rectangle, also known as YouTube vs. Ad Blocker, is an exploitable object-labeling meme based on an original webcomic by cartoonist MadeByTio. The four-panel meme features an anthropomorphic green rectangle delivering a statement, after which two muscular red and pink men laugh and beat him up. The original image showing the rectangle as an "ad blocker" and the buff cartoons as "ads" was posted in March 2021, with its usage in memes shortly after.

Origin

On March 4th, 2021, artist MadeByTio posted an original comic to the subreddit /r/funny^[1] depicting two ads beating up an ad blocker, gathering over 5,000 upvotes in over a year (seen below). The strip was also posted to Instagram,^[2] by the cartoonist, where it gathered over 24,000 likes in a similar timeframe.

The image was first edited and reposted to Reddit^[3] on March 25th by Redditor This-Wrongdoer-1858 to /r/dankmemes, where it gathered over 63,000 upvotes in over a year (seen below). The meme was also edited and uploaded to Imgur that same day.^[4]

Spread

The format continued to spread in consecutive months, with Redditor^[5] Fleykel posting an edit to /r/gaming on March 26th, 2022, gathering over 400 upvotes in roughly a year (seen below, left). On March 28th, Redditor^[6] deathstar10154 then posted an edit to /r/PrequelMemes that gathered over 11,000 upvotes in a similar timeframe (seen below, right).

On April 8th, 2021, Redditor^[7] Sergeant_Smile posted a version of the meme to /r/teenagers, gathering over 17,000 upvotes in over a year (seen below, left). On April 9th, an unknown Redditor posted a version of the meme to /r/memes, gathering over 31,000 likes in a similar timeframe (seen below, right).^[8]

Template

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References