The Straight To Jail meme, also known as You Go To Jail, or the Right To Jail meme, is a moment from an episode of Parks and Recreation featuring guest character Raul (played by Fred Armisen) who boasts about how jail makes his country great. While the full rant is pretty impressive, the simple phrase stuck out to fans as perfect meme fodder, alongside photos and video of Armisen as Raul.
What episode of Parks and Rec is the Straight To Jail meme from?
The episode of Parks and Recreation that features the moment is titled “Sister City,” which aired in October 2009. The episode features a delegation coming from Pawnee’s sister city.
Led by Raul, the group causes chaos with their different ways during their visit. When they see what goes down at a particularly messy town hall meeting, Raul is astounded at the public’s behavior.
This leads him to go to a rant about how jail is used to control such behavior in his country. The deadpan rattling of situations tickled the funny bones of many.
Where are the armed men who come in to take the protestors away? Where are they? This kind of behavior is never tolerated in Baraqua. You shout like that they put you in jail. Right away. No trial, no nothing.
Journalists, we have a special jail for journalists. You are stealing: right to jail. You are playing music too loud: right to jail, right away. Driving too fast: jail. Slow: jail. You are charging too high prices for sweaters, glasses: you right to jail. You undercook fish? Believe it or not, jail.
You overcook chicken, also jail. Undercook, overcook. You make an appointment with the dentist and you don’t show up, believe it or not, jail, right away. We have the best patients in the world because of jail.
Rise of the Straight To Jail meme
The moment later appeared on YouTube, where it began to go viral. Over time, the moment has become the subject of the Mandela effect. While many people remember Armisen repeatedly saying “straight to jail,” in reality, his character Raul says “right to jail.” Because of that, memes can be seen with both phrases used interchangeably.
The slight switch may be the result of the popularity of Monopoly. The popular family board game has a space on its board that reads “Go to jail.” There’s also a card that can send you to that space that reads, “Go to jail. Go directly to jail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.”
And there’s another Mandela effect there! Instead of “directly,” however, many remember the card saying “straight to jail.”
Meme examples
