Bill Cosby referred to this in many of his stand-up routines, including his mother's threat to "knock the black off of him".In the aforementioned superhero bit, his mother smacked him so hard that his butt fell off, which prompted this legendary quip from his friends: "It's yo momma's hand, man! It's yo momma hand! Just run! Drop yo butt and run!".She beat him so bad, it was Monday when he woke up. It was for talking back to her (which you did not do with your parents back in the day) during lawn cutting day, and then turning around while she was reprimanding him. Sinbad even had a routine wherein his mother turned into a superhero for the express purpose of catching him and giving him a whupping. Cited by many Black stand-up comedians.Alternately, older people probably remember too well when THEY were spanked/beaten as punishment. A possible explanation is that young kids may make up a large part of the shows' viewers and hence may find this sort of punishment relatable. A variation of this trope in a Southern US setting is "Do you want me to cut a switch"?Ī common and rather peculiar feature of this trope is that the son or sometimes daughter who is threatened with the belt is often high school or even college-aged, but no one on the show seems to find it odd that they are still being spanked as if they were children. "You're not too big to turn over my knee" is a common variation.
And despite the fact that we're mostly talking about fathers and sons, mothers and daughters are just as likely to apply for this trope, especially the Apron Matron disciplining the Bratty Teenage Daughter.
Sometimes this trope is inverted when the father, after realizing he has been unfair with his son, hands his son the belt at the last minute and tells the boy to spank him.