Can't Get Away with Nuthin': Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:quino-
{{quote|'''Buffy''': I told one lie. I had one drink.
'''Giles''': Yes, [[Space Whale Aesop|and you were very nearly devoured by a giant demon snake]]. The words "Let that be a lesson" are a tad redundant at this juncture.|''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'', "Reptile Boy"}}
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Okay folks, listen up: many of the dangerous behaviors in life are as insidious and widespread as they are because ''most of the time, nothing bad comes of doing them''. If you don't wear your seat belt, most of the time, you'll be fine. It's just that on the rare occasion that fate calls you on it, the results are usually catastrophic.
But if you do something wrong/dangerous/stupid on a TV show and divine justice ''isn't'' carried out, sometimes [[Media Watchdog
So on some TV shows, ''every time'' you do something bad, you ''will'' get caught.
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There is a possibility that this trope is used simply because it's a good way to end a particular story, or an author's personal fantasy or something and not as a deliberate way to get any message across. If fantasy was always like real life, then it would probably be completely boring, so you can't discount the possibility that someone's just trying to tell a good story.
On a [[
This is sometimes called an "Institutional Lie"
The problem with this kind of lie is that it doesn't convince anyone. Rather than having the desired effect, the audience is liable to dismiss the morality play as obvious fiction, and their trust is lost.
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If the disaster that comes from risky behavior is implausible rather than merely happening quicker than you might expect, it's a [[Space Whale Aesop]].
A common delivery method for
Often [[Selective Enforcement]] seems to be intent on teaching the Aesop of "just because your friends are getting away with it does NOT mean YOU will". However, seeing it happen to someone else isn't enough. Just because he can't get away with anything doesn't mean you can't, and [[Broken Aesop|that's what people end up learning]]. Except for when this becomes [[Truth in Television]] and the person really gets bitten in the ass a couple times in a row when they try getting away with stuff.
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** The movie messes around with this; in the original comic, Peter ignores the criminal because he's letting his newfound fame go to his head and thinks it's not his problem, so it does generally feel like he's being taught a karmic lesson in humility. In the movie, the crook robs the wrestling promoter who screwed Peter out of his prize money and Pete lets him go in order to spite the man, which lessens the impact somewhat because it's easy to sympathize with Peter's attitude in that scene.
*** You could argue that it actually increases the impact, but changed the moral. Instead of being about humility, it was about responsibility (which the comic was also about. [[Comes Great Responsibility|After all...]]), which the movies are big on. Yes the actions were understandable, but Spider Man has to rise above that.
* [[The Cape (trope)|The Plutonian]] from ''[[Irredeemable]]'' took a 10 minute break on the moon to get away from the constant calls for help that his [[Super Senses|superhuman hearing]] could pick up. In those 10 minutes, a sonic virus was released that turned hundreds of children in to walking skeletal corpses. This, as much as anything, contributed to his going insane.
* The law laid down by the Dundonian Presbeteryans who founded D.C. Thomson to the writers of ''[[The Beano]]'' and ''[[The Dandy (
* In ''[[
== Film ==
* An [[Enforced Trope]] during the [[The Golden Age of Hollywood]], where the Hays Code prohibited any sort of [[Karma Houdini]].
** The original ''[[
** The original ''[[The Italian Job]]''
* A notable aversion of this trope is in the 1998 film ''[[The Faculty]]'', in which one of the main characters cooks up and sells unnamed "drugs", which prove to be crucial to foiling the alien scheme, as the drug's desiccant properties make them lethal to the water-dependent aliens and the humans they've possessed. In this case, the drug dealer not only survives, but also saves the day and gets the girl. Of course, the "drugs" {{spoiler|turn out to be ordinary caffeine pills ground up into powder}}. So a reversion to the trope because the "drug dealer" is really conning the people who want to do drugs, which makes it okay because they're getting what ''they'' deserve..
* Played straight, but justified, in ''[[The Dark Knight]]''. {{spoiler|Two-Face}}, having sneaked into Sal Maroni's car, {{spoiler|flips a coin for Maroni, and Sal wins. He then flips one for Sal's driver, ''puts on his seatbelt'', and shoots the driver in the back of the head}}. The car rolls over. {{spoiler|Sal wasn't wearing a seatbelt, and is implied to be dead at the end of the film. Two-Face}} is seen later, seemingly without an (additional) scratch.
** Of course, it'd be hard to spot bruises under his suit, and any flesh damage to the visible areas would {{spoiler|pale in comparison to the hideous mutilation}}.
* In ''[[
* The basis of the Sam Raimi movie ''[[Drag Me to Hell]]'': a good-natured loan officer turns down a mortgage renewal from an old gypsy woman to show her boss that she is worthy of a promotion. The gypsy ends up placing a curse on her that literally summons demons to [[Exactly What It Says
* ''French Kiss'' basically runs this Trope into the ground as Kate (Meg Ryan) loses her citizenship to ''two'' countries because she had one puff of a marijuana cigarette years ago in college - and got busted - and ''didn't even enjoy it''.
* ''Kids'', in which {{spoiler|Jenny gets AIDS}} after having unprotected sex one time.
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* Persistent trend in ''[[Little Women]]'' and its sequels.
** Amy borrows money from Meg to buy very trendy limes and [[In
** Jo refuses to forgive Amy for burning her book (in revenge for Jo going to a play without her), when Amy sincerely repents and begs for forgiveness. The next day, Amy nearly drowns from falling through the ice on a river when skating with Laurie.
** Meg visits her rich friend Annie; after humbly dressing in her own worn clothing all week, she lets Annie [[Beautiful All Along|doll her up in her sister's party dress,]] and acts like an airhead to fit in better and [[Stepford Smiler|hide her issues]]. This is the same night Laurie turns out to be her dancing partner, and he immediately [[What the Hell, Hero?|lays the verbal smackdown on Meg]].
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* In ''[[Sweet Valley High]]'', a secondary character dies after doing ''one and a half lines'' of cocaine. Elizabeth Wakefield drives drunk on one occasion after her drink is spiked and gets in a car crash, which results in the death of her twin sister's boyfriend and her arrest.
** The latter is a [[Double Aesop]], too; while Elizabeth is in a car crash and arrest, her twin sister was the one who spiked the drink, and is punished for her actions by a dead boyfriend.
* In ''[[Comfort Woman (
* [[
* Explicitly avoided by [[Cory Doctorow]] in his book ''Little Brother'', as shown [https://web.archive.org/web/20131224014247/http://www.locusmag.com/Perspectives/2009/11/cory-doctorow-teen-sex.html here].
* Paula Danziger employs this trope in a few of her books, particularly with heroines who decide to put themselves first for once after spending most of the book placating or looking after other people.
** In ''There's a Bat in Bunk Five'', Marcy spends most of her time as camp counsellor trying to reach out to Ginger, a troubled and seriously obnoxious girl who makes life hell for both Marcy and the other youngsters in her cabin. Eventually, Marcy pretty much gives up on Ginger and starts enjoying her time at camp on her own terms, even starting up a romance...''then'' Ginger decides she wants to talk, when Marcy is occupied. Ginger throws a hissy fit and runs
** In ''It's an Aardvark Eat Turtle World'', Rosie seems to spend most of her time being the diplomat, and has had to make sacrifices to ensure her mother's relationship with her best friend's father is a success, such as giving up her pets because her kinda-stepfather is allergic. When she goes on holiday with her best friend/sister, Phoebe, she ends up feeling like a third wheel as Phoebe practically ignores her. Eventually, Rosie falls for Phoebe's cousin, Jason, and starts dating him, one of the few things she does for herself...whereupon Phoebe accuses her of being selfish and putting Jason first, resulting in Phoebe's ill-thought out decision to move back with her mother. Rosie spends much of the time afterwards feeling guilty about this turn of events.
* In ''[[Maximum Ride]]: The Angel Experiment'', the Flock spend a night in New York sleeping in trees. They wake up the next morning with the police calling for them that what they're doing is illegal and to get down right now so they can have their parents called. Gazzy wonders who even looks up trees and Max comments "like there aren't worse problems going on than a bunch of kids sleeping in a tree".
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* Josh from ''[[Drake and Josh]]'' fits this trope. Drake and/or Megan can often slip through the cracks when it comes to mischief, but that ability falls far short of Josh.
* On ''[[Seinfeld]]'', Elaine skips the boss's dinner party or whatever event and tells him she has to visit her father in the hosptal. She is in fact going to the Yankees game with George and Kramer. When Kramer is hit by a foul ball, their picture is snapped and appears in the sports section the next day, which of course, Elaine's boss never fails to read.
* Likewise on ''[[Home Improvement (TV series)|Home Improvement]]'' when Jill doesn't feel like visiting with her Dad, she out-of-character makes up a white lie as an excuse for why she has to skip town and miss him. He dies. Naturally, her last words to him were another lie to get him off the phone.
** On the other hand, most of the episode is about people trying to convince her that she shouldn't feel bad about it and that it was a complete coincidence.
* On [[The George Lopez Show]], this was one of George's catch phrases. "I can't do [[Funetik Aksent|NUTH-EEN]]!"
** He continues to use it occasionally on Lopez Tonight.
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* The show ''Our House'' loves this trope. It the kids do anything wrong, they ''will'' get caught, one way or another. There is one double subversion. On a dare, David takes Gus's car for a joy ride around the block. After returning to the driveway, he finds a small, but noticeable dent. After going to extraordinary lengths to (successfully) get the car fixed, he seemingly pulls it off. {{spoiler|At the very end, however, Gus comments on how the dent that had been there for a couple years was now mysteriously gone.}}
** A near aversion takes place in another episode, where David leaves some dirty rags lying about in the basement. A few days later, the house catches fire, but quick thinking and the timely action of the fire department esnures that there is no serius damage, and no injuries. Afterward, Gus tells the family that he doesn't want to know whose fault it was, as it might be simply too big for him to forgive.
* On ''[[Saved
** Because, clearly, refilling a glass is unheard of.
** They'd have gotten away with it, if only they'd stuck with their original "swerved to miss a dog" story. But no, they had to tell a different story to each set of parents specifically so their web of lies could unravel within the twenty-two minutes available.
** You can't mention SBTB without mentioning "Jessie's Song", where Jessie has a full-on junkie meltdown after crashing from... caffeine pills. "Narm", indeed.
* ''[[
* ''Degrassi''. Constantly. The whole franchise:
* Done part-way on ''[[Degrassi the Next Generation]]''. Every "high-risk behavior" has immediate consequences. A girl gets pregnant from the one time she has unprotected sex (this one actually is true - you ''can'' get pregnant or infected from even one instance of unprotected sex, but the moral ought to be "use a condom", not "don't have sex ever"). The most popular girl in the school swallows one pill of ecstasy, and in the resulting high she manages to lose all her friends (plus, she has to go into rehab). But the kids almost always get away with petty crime, like stealing school property or cheating a restaurant.
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* The episode "Cold Turkey" of ''The Brothers Garcia'' took this to the extreme. Sonia caught the flu off Lorena so Lorena prayed to God and said she would give up watching her novellas for a whole month if it meant Sonia would get better. Sonia inexplicably recovered the next day though Lorena cracked after about a week and Sonia fell ill as soon as she switched the TV on. Then Larry and Lorena go to see a priest who says that they shouldn't make deals with God...
* Partly averted in a ''[[Joan of Arcadia]]'' episode where Friedman talks Luke into trying marijuana. Rather than doing anything particularly dangerous or stupid under the influence, or even getting caught by an authority, Luke merely stresses out too much due to the resulting hallucinations and decides to quit then and there. Only partly averted, though, as using marijuana ''does not'' [[Marijuana Is LSD|cause hallucinations]]. Paranoia, sometimes, but not hallucinations.
* In spite of the fact that several of the secondary characters on ''[[Freaks and Geeks]]'' are total potheads with no [[Anvilicious]] consequences, the ''one'' time that main character Lindsay smokes up, she totally freaks out like someone in a scene from ''[[
* Played for laughs in ''[[The Worst Week of My Life]]'', in which even the smallest transgressions that protagonist Howard Steel commits are guaranteed to backfire on him in the most humiliating way possible at exactly the worst moment for him personally. For added 'hideously unfair [[Chew Toy|suffering]] value', however, Howard can't even get away with things that he ''didn't'' do, or even that he did ''right'', because [[Kafka Komedy|that's just how it works]].
* ''[[
** In the case of the latter, he was probably more concerned with the abusive [[Sadist Teacher]]
* Arguably, ''[[
* A ''[[Taxi]]'' flashback episode shows a single taste of a "hash brownie" transforming straitlaced Harvard student James Caldwell into spaced-out hippie freak Jim Ignatowski.
** A similar transformation happens to ''[[The Simpsons]]''' Barney Gumble on having his first beer, in a flashback in the "Mr. Plow" episode.
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** ''[http://buffy.wikia.com/wiki/Beer_Bad Beer Bad].''
** There's the Season 2 episode where Buffy blows off training to go to a frat party.
{{quote|
'''Giles''': Yes, and you were nearly devoured by a giant demon snake. I think the words 'let that be a lesson' are a tad redundant at this juncture. }}
* On ''[[Beverly Hills, 90210]]'', resident nerd Andrea ends up pregnant and married within weeks of losing her virginity, to the second guy she slept with. The plot was done to incorporate the real-life pregnancy of the actress, and the writers explained that they thought it would be too much to have her pregnant by the guy who deflowered her. Still, getting pregnant by Guy #2 isn't that much better and when compared with the rest of the gang, who had been sexually active for years, Andrea got shafted.
** Don't forget how one beer seemed enough to be alcoholism.
* On [[
** With the zero tolerance policy a lot of schools have, being threatened with a suspension could have been excused as plausible. Three months is still a long time to be grounded.
** In the U.S., cheating on a large exam is considered a very serious offense, but you probably won't risk expulsion in high school. By contrast, in some countries, you are expected to help others on a test.
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* Invoked on ''[[True Blood]]''. The first time Jessica sneaks out to go to a friend's party is the night she gets abducted and turned into a vampire.
** However, being turned into a vampire gives her the nerve to stand up to her [[Abusive Parents]] religious zealot of a father and defend her mother and little sister.
* Pretty heavily subverted in [[That '70s Show]]. The main characters smoke pot nearly every episode, but have only been caught twice or so. Even then, they didn't receive much punishment.
* In a ''[[Law and Order Special Victims Unit]]'' episode about underage drinking, not only do the kids end up in jail for underage consumption, two of them proceed to get into an offscreen drunk-driving accident and die.
* In ''[[Pushing Daisies]]'' most of Ned's childhood was defined by this trope, particularly anything dealing with his [[Back
* On an episode of ''Two of a Kind'', [[Straight Man|Kevin]] is convinced to call in sick at work and go to a ballgame instead. He wins a car because of this- and ends up on the big screen and the evening news. When his boss calls, {{spoiler|the trope is revealed to be subverted; he was just asking to test drive the car}}.
* This is first seemingly played straight in one episode of ''[[CSI:
* In the ''[[
** Also an aversion, though, since the computer responsible for determining sentencing, which can read minds and see every crime you've ever committed, lets Lister go free "despite a number of petty criminal acts."
* On a first season episode of ''[[
** Actuslly Phoebe's reasoning is "once you break the small rules, it's only a matter of time before the big ones are next" which is a pretty valid point. Using their powers on a mortal is very tricky and could risk exposure.
* ''[[What I Like About You]]'' has Val lie to their Aunt Wanda that Holly is ill so they don't have to go to her house for Thanksgiving. Guess who shows up at the house checking on Holly.
* The opinion of the daughter on ''[[Necessary Roughness (TV series)|Necessary Roughness]]'', that her mother comes down harder on her than on her brother when she gets caught acting up. [[Unreliable Narrator|May or may not be true]], considering that her brother is more of a small-time con artist and lothario - and is generally smarter about concealing his antics - while she does things like steal the car and crash into a restaurant.
* On the American edition of ''[[Whose Line Is It Anyway?
* ''[[Kenan and Kel]]'' would have this kind of setting in [[Once an Episode]].
* ''[[Family Matters]]'' sometimes used this trope where Laura was concerned; many plots revolved around Laura doing something/being pressured into doing something wrong, and then coincidence punishes her, either by having something catastrophic happen, or having her parents just happen to show up to catch her at it. In the [[Very Special Episode]] on gun violence, Laura's friend is shot in the arm as soon as Laura attempts to buy a pistol; in another, Laura buys a fake ID to go to a male strip club with her friends. It just happens to be on the same night her aunt and grandmother drag her mother to see the revue.
* "Glee" manages to both subvert and play this straight. The episode that focuses on drinking? Everyone suffers minor consequences, but in general the ending attitude is "we can't exactly stop teens from drinking, so let's sorta make them drink safe". But [[Laser-Guided Karma]] is in full force the ''one time'' that Quinn is shown texting in a car. She gets in an accident and temporarily wheelchair-bound.
== Newspaper Comics ==
* In one ''[[Calvin and Hobbes]]'' strip, Calvin is talking to Susie in class. When Susie tells him to stop talking, she is immediately caught by teacher, who only punishes Susie. Susie gets moved to the front of the class, and when she gets an [[Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue|insulting note]] from Calvin, she writes one in retaliation, only to get caught in the act and sent to the principal. Considering the reputation Calvin has, Wormwood's actions require some explanation. It's her job to treat all of her students fairly, even Calvin. She probably didn't hear Calvin talking. And besides, everything worked out when Susie actually gets a chance to explain everything to the principal. She got off the hook, and [[Laser-Guided Karma]] hit Calvin like a ton of bricks.
{{quote|
'''Principal''' (holding an overflowing folder) Oh yes, we've got quite a file on our friend Calvin... }}
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** To be fair, it's when you get CAUGHT attacking someone. If you stealth kill someone while invisible or snipe them from a dark alley or use untraceable disciplines to make them commit suicide, there won't be any trouble. Many other games can take this to a "Dude WTF?" level, with small crimes NO ONE EVEN NOTICES getting you in serious trouble. In Fable, you can be attacked by guards by accidentally taking one step inside the house of SOMEONE WHO LOVES YOU a few seconds after shops close. Although since they just stop if you apologize, it's kinda subverted.
** In the patched version I have, they do attacked people in the knife fights.
** In the earlier Masquerade game, ''Redemption'', your party of
* Done to a huge extent in ''[[The Elder Scrolls]] [[The Elder Scrolls Four|IV: Oblivion]]''. The guards quickly find out if you've committed even the smallest crime (in this case let's say you stole a turnip from a shop), soon other city guards are alerted about this armed and dangerous turnip thief. Even if your fine is only five gold, the guards will stop at nothing to apprehend you.
** More to the point, the guards have x-ray vision, as you can be in the middle of someone's house, in their basement, with no one around. Breaking in and walking around is no problem, but the second you pick something up the guards will run into the house run down the stairs, and tell you to "Stop thief!"...unless you are crouching which somehow makes you invisible. Oh and a guard can see into your pack and identify stolen goods when you chat with them, and somehow stolen goods are distinguishable from regular goods. Yes it appears that every time someone buys a carrot, they etch their name into it.
** [[Memetic Mutation|STOP RIGHT THERE CRIMINAL SCUM!]]
** ''[[The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim]]'' steps it up with what may be [[Artificial Brilliance]]: you may think you've gotten away with stealing that turnip, as the shopkeeper didn't react, you have zero bounty and the guards aren't hunting you down...but then you meet some well-armed mercenaries later in your travels, hired to teach you a lesson about stealing. If that's not enough? The ''Dark Brotherhood'' gets a contract on you too!
* Done to a rather comedic extent in Wario's story in ''[[
* ''[[Grand Theft Auto]]''. In something of a subversion, you can do all sorts of crazy stuff and not be punished, so long as you do it in moderation. The police start taking action at one star, but a quick ride around the block fixes that. Hit two stars, and only heading to a Pay'N'Spray (or other options) will get rid of them. Otherwise, they'll just keep chasing you, and everytime you respond with force they'll up the ante. By the time you cap out the wanted meter, you will be hounded by the military in their instant death collision tanks.
** Played totally straight in [[Grand Theft Auto]] IV, where the police will go ''batshit fucking insane'' trying to catch you for a fender bender. Also falls into [[Selective Enforcement]], because Niko can get run over all day long and the cops won't care.
* Many [[Nancy Drew (
** And then it gets stretched to the point of self-parody. "After you've been knocked out, tied up and left in a burning shed, ''be sure to put out the fire''!" (''Ghost Dogs of Moon Lake'')
* [[Sierra]] games can be just as bad. In the original ''[[Police Quest]]'' if you fail to check all your car's wheels, you'll get a flat tire and a Game Over. In ''[[Laura Bow]]'' II if you fail to look both ways when crossing the street, you'll get hit by a car and a...
** In the first ''[[Space Quest]]'' game, fail fasten your seatbelt in the escape pod at the beginning of the game, and you'll get an instant Game Over the moment you attempt to take off.
* In the [[Hellsinker]] universe is karma a very real force of nature and missdeads where punished swift and harshly. In order to free humanity from the shackles of karma the Garland system was build in order to controll it's flow. {{spoiler|However this comes to bite humanity in the ass since four children where sacrificed whose spirits power the system and they grew vengeful at humanity, and eventually caused the shutdown of the system. [[Karmic Death]] indeed}}.
* In [[Rune Factory: Frontier]], if you confess to another women while married, your wife will walk in and beat you up, leaving you with one HP and no RP. Also, her FP and LP will be set to zero, and she'll make you crappy meals.
* Similar to the ''Elder Scrolls'' example above, ''Fallout 3'' has plenty of this. Not only will you have Regulators hunting you down if you do bad things, but all of the NPCs are [[Clairvoyant Security Force|psychic]] enough to know it too, even if they don't immediately turn hostile. For example, if you kill everyone in Arefu, Lucy West in Megaton will still say something to the effect of "I heard about your little killing spree in Arefu. Get away from me!", even if there was no one around to witness it. Speaking of Megaton, decide to nuke it and ''everyone'', including James, will somehow know it was you. And of course, there's Three Dog, who [[What the Hell, Hero?|always manages to find out]] whenever you take the evil option in a quest.
* Some of the games made by Mat Dickie/MDickie, such as ''HARDtime...'' and ''[[The You Testament]]'' have this sort of thing. You can sit there and watch other characters beat the ever-loving crap out of each other, carry weapons, steal weapons, etc., but if ''you'' try to do this, you'll get caught. No ifs, ands or buts about it.
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* ''[[Regular Show]]'' has this in '''spades'''. It's practically ''built'' on this trope.
* ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures]]'' parodied the above, in which Buster, Plucky, and Hamton all got drunk off of a single beer (which they shared, so it would have really been more like a third each, making the plot even more ridiculous), and then proceeded to demonstrate the dangers of drunk driving by driving a car off a cliff.
** Double-parodied, in fact; at the beginning of the episode, Hamton protests that Buster's insistence that they drink his dad's beer is wildly out of character. "I know," replies Buster, "But in this episode, we're showing the evils of alcohol." It's a more lighthearted version of it's sister show ''[[
* In its early days, one of the initial controversies that arose from ''[[The Simpsons]]'' was how rarely Bart received punishment for his misbehavior.
** Played straight in the episode "Marge Be Not Proud" where Bart is goaded into shoplifting by Nelson, Jimbo and Kearney. He is immediately grabbed by the store detective, banned from the Try N' Save and later publicly outed and shamed.
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*** And then it ends up completely [[Deconstruction|de-constructed]] as the townsfolk realise that by sending her to jail under this, they've cut out all the good things Marge does around town. Worst. Bake sale. Ever.
* ''[[Futurama]]'' episode "Three Hundred Big Boys". At the end, everyone but Bender has learned an important lesson. When he points it out, the cops show up to arrest him for his theft of a valuable cigar, and he triumphantly cries out "Alright, closure!" However, considering Bender usually gets away with his crap...
* Many an animated plot about characters who are playing hooky from school (usually otherwise honest people) have it so that the day they pick to do ends up being a day that whoever went to school actually enjoyed. (See ''[[Rocket Power]]'' "Snow Day", ''[[Hey Arnold!]]!'' "Hookey", etc.)
* ''[[The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron|The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius]]'', "Party At Neutron's": Jimmy ''almost'' gets away with throwing a party while his parents are out for the night, but then gets in trouble when he forgot the velociraptor in the closet that someone had accidentally brought to the party with one of his time machines.
* Done [[
* Averted quite often in ''[[WITCH (
* In ''[[Buzz Lightyear of Star Command]]'', any time a character tries to do something behind another character's back or disobeys orders, the most dramatic, most impossible, most chaotic thing the writers can think of will happen. Legions of bounty hunters will try to annihilate the guilty party's best friend, the protagonists will wind up in the villain's clutches, Star Command being taken over by giant pants...
* Played with a few times in ''[[South Park]]'':
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** They did the same thing one or two episodes earlier, when he started finally defending himself from the bullies by using his powers to make a fool out of them. [[Anvilicious|Nickelodeon]] [[Personal Gain Hurts|REALLY]] [[The Complainer Is Always Wrong|has a thing against]] [[Ambition Is Evil|heroes using their powers to get ahead in life]]. Just ask [[Jimmy Neutron]] or [[Fairly Oddparents|Timmy Turner...]]
* In one episode of the less-than-well-remembered cartoon ''[[Life With Louie]]'', the title character steals a single piece of candy from a store, and is informed that the following night's inventory check will make sure that the store owners know ''exactly'' how many were stolen and whose parents to call. Might have been a BS scare tactic, but it's still [[Anvilicious]] in its use of this trope.
* [[Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy]]
* In "[[Doug]]'s Math Problem", Doug fails a math test and his parents receive a school letter. His numerous attempts to see what it says first are thwarted. The school alarm system goes off when his hacker friends try to see what the school computer says. When he tries to open the letter, he cuts a corner off when he tries to use scissors, cuts himself with a letter opener, and spills liquid white and ink. When he uses steam to pry it open, it makes the ink run. Just as he is about to read it, his dad comes home and he decides to confess everything.
* ''The All New [[
* Averted in the ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
* [[Invader Zim]] has Dib.
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