The line comes from a short interview clip of Mike Tyson, the former heavyweight champion, in which he deadpans that he broke his back, adding 'spinal' for emphasis. The odd phrasing and his flat delivery made the moment endlessly quotable, and it was clipped, captioned and reposted across meme pages and short-form video apps. It now lives on as a reaction sound for exaggerated defeat and mock suffering, surviving because it works on any clip where someone dramatically throws in the towel.