‘Put him in the pool and delete the ladder’: The internet has realized that Elon Musk moves like a Sims character, and now you’ll never unsee it

Some days, Elon Musk feels less like a real, breathing human being and more like a walking caricature, who would be far more amusing and entertaining were he more of a puppet than a puppeteer when it comes to the current Trump administration, whose influence even extends outside the realm of U.S. politics.

For various reasons, the multi-billionaire, out of all the 8 billion people that inhabit the Earth, must be among those who could most make one wonder whether this is real life or some absurd simulation we can’t wake up from.

Speaking of simulation, most of us were already aware that Musk, on top of his peculiar way of thinking, gesticulates and moves around in quite a unique fashion – something which became painfully evident when, as Tim Walz so eloquently put it, he was “jumping around skipping like a dips***” on a Trump rally stage. But, with a recent viral social media post, netizens were faced with a comparison so poignant it will be hard to ever forget, whether we like it or not.

Is this real life or is this just an EA videogame?

With a side-by-side view of Elon Musk exuberantly posing for photos and a lookalike The Sims character in the creation menu, it’s nearly impossible not to perceive the uncanny similarities between how the two move.

That does not mean that the wealthiest CEO’s diehard fans will allow anything – no matter how lighthearted – that remotely makes fun of Musk slide without challenge. One wrote: “That’s not the way he normally moves. He’s posing for photos. Add another other person into that scenario and they are going to be moving unnatural as well.” Surely there are no other recorded or photographed red-carpet events with posing celebrities that could have originated any similar social media viral meme.

The video game comparisons did not end with The Sims. Another X user posted the same video but, instead of a split screen between Musk and a character, it features the Fortnight emote menu.

Well, there is one potential argument against the notion that Musk moves as robotically as a video game character. This would be his recent “my-heart-goes-out-to-you” gesture, which looked suspiciously close to a Nazi salute. I, for one, have yet to see anyone in a video game I’ve personally played or watched be played do that. Not that Elon would know, considering he, until recently, kept up the pretense that he was a hardcore gamer when, in truth, he still dragged and dropped items into the inventory.

But committing gaming sacrilege may be one of the least worrisome attitudes Musk has recently taken – except that it hints at his willingness to lie and put himself on a pedestal of underserved grandeur. One should find more issues in the way he speaks about some foreign nations’ leaders and politicians while lauding others, how he perceives “efficiency” as being at the expense of basic dignities and rights, and how he’s one of the strongest players – for once in his life – in this oligarchy that has been forming and consuming the American political scene.

Musk may have moves like a video game character, but his mindset is more akin to that of the player in any of The Sims: someone who feels entitled to and is more than content about acting like the all-powerful “God” of SimsVille.