The line comes from Sluipschutters, the Dutch sketch comedy series broadcast by BNNVARA, and is associated with actor Leo Alkemade. In the sketch context the phrase 'Ik dacht dat dat kon' works as a naive excuse after crossing a line, which made it easy to lift as a standalone reaction. Clips of the moment circulated in Dutch meme edits, where users boosted the audio into an earrape version to exaggerate the outburst. That distorted cut is now reused far beyond the original sketch as a generic shout for getting caught out.