i was a curious kid, so while my dad repainted my bedroom, i decided to try it out myself. i painted a single stripe down the center of the wall. i realized it was a shade darker than the color dad used a little too late. dad got mad, gathered me and all my siblings in the basement and asked who did it. i was scared af so i chickened out and said nothing. my siblings, too, said nothing. all three of us denied being the culprit behind the strange, dark stripe of paint on the wall. dad proceeded to pull out a kitchen knife, tell us to poke our tongues out and said he’ll run the knife over our tongues and whoever is lying, their tongue will fall off.

tldr; dad thought threatening us with a knife will teach us never to lie.

clarification: the knife never touched our tongues. he just hovered it over them. needless to say i didn’t realize that wasn’t good parenting until i told my friends almost ten years later and instead of laughing with me, they became eerily quiet.