It was supposed to be a quick lunch. I had just gotten off a long shift, still in uniform, and picked up my daughter, Zariah, from daycare. She’s five, and obsessed with anything I wear—so naturally, she begged to wear my old patrol cap and the whole police officer outfit we got her.

We went into Burger King just to grab her favorite chicken fries and a shake. She was strutting around like she was the sheriff of the whole restaurant. Everyone seemed to find it cute—older couple smiled, a teenager held the door open for her and called her “officer.”

But then this woman—mid-thirties maybe—stood near the soda machine, phone angled just enough that I could tell she was recording. I saw her zoom in on Zariah in the cap. Then on me. I assumed she was just being nosy.

Didn’t think anything of it until the next morning, when a coworker texted me a screenshot from Twitter. It was us, clear as day, with the caption: “Why are officers letting children cosplay as cops in public? This is messed up.” Thousands of likes. Comments calling me unprofessional, others talking about trauma, someone even tagging my department.

By noon, I had a meeting scheduled with Internal Affairs.

I tried to explain it was just my daughter being a kid. But they kept asking about “public perception,” and if I “understood how this might be misinterpreted.”

They said they’d let me know next week what they decide.

And just now—I got another message.

This one wasn’t from work.

It was from a woman named Dr. Amari Toussaint, a professor of media ethics and public perception at some university in North Carolina. She said she saw the post going viral and had some thoughts. Honestly, I almost ignored it. But something about the way she worded her message felt different.

She wrote:
“I think what happened to you and your daughter is a perfect example of how online outrage often lacks real context. If you’re open to it, I’d love to talk.”