that's what your mom said

9.9

A joke reply that mentions someone's mother to tease them about sex

idiom

Offensive

: eso dijo tu madre (vulgar, ofensivo)

After I mentioned how hard it was, she laughed and quipped, 'that's what your mom said.'

Examples

In our group chat, someone inevitably types 'that's what your mom said' whenever a double entendre pops up.
Whenever I complain about being tired, he always replies, 'that's what your mom said.'
Don't that's what your mom said!
That's what your mom said!
Whenever I make a joke about my workload, my friend cheekily responds, 'that's what your mom said.'
In our discussions, it's a running joke that someone will always follow up with 'that's what your mom said' to lighten the mood.
He couldn't resist replying to my comment about being busy with a quick, 'that's what your mom said.'

Synonyms

that's what she said

vsthat's what your mom said

NSFW

1 9.9

A joke phrase people say after someone says something that can sound sexual

uses the same joke but targets someone's family to tease or insult

Surface Forms

that's what your mom said main

Morphology

that's + what + your + mom + said

Although the literal meaning ('that is what your mother said') is compositionally derivable from the parts, the conventional pragmatic use as a teasing/sexualizing retort relies on a culturally specific joke template (like 'that's what she said') and cannot be predicted from the constituent words alone. A B1 learner who knows the individual words would likely understand the literal proposition but would not infer the idiomatic, humorous intent without prior exposure, so it is not transparent.

Etymology

That's what your mom said comes from an older joke pattern, 'that's what she said', where people point out a sentence's 'double meaning' to make it funny. Adding your mom makes the joke personal, as if someone's mother really said the line, so people use it to jokingly make a sentence sound sexual or 'to tease' someone.