It’s hard to say that you support the police these days without receiving backlash.

I, like any other sane individual, do not support brutality or unnecessary force. I don’t want to see innocent people die. Like any other field, there are good people and bad people in the police force. Similarly, there are good lawyers and bad lawyers, good teachers and bad teachers, good doctors and bad doctors and the list goes on.

I’m not here to tell you which cops are innocent and which cops aren’t. I wasn’t there when the instances of possible police brutality occurred. The only people who truly know what happened during those events were the people who were there. Perhaps it was justified, perhaps it was not. Just like anyone else, I believe there should be a punishment if it was an instance of police brutality.

What I am here to say is that I support the police. I do not believe that the actions of a few should reflect the majority.

I am the daughter of a police officer. My father has sacrificed for his job again and again, and it breaks my heart to hear people say “F*** the police,” “cops are pigs,” or that these officers deserve to die. My father has worked in almost every field of his police department, from homicides, to child abuse and crimes against children, to missing and exploited children and the list goes on. I have watched it take tolls on him. I see compassion in his heart for each of the people he helps during this traumatic period of their lives. I see him get called in at 2 a.m. to find a missing child. I see him not speak at dinner after a particularly disturbing case. I watch him sacrifice sleep, time with his family, time off on Christmas, etc. to go help these people who he doesn’t know, never expecting a “thank you.”

And then I watch officers get murdered for simply being a police officer. I watch the Internet break out in cheers over the deaths of these fallen men and women. I watch my father hang his head when he loses a friend in the line of duty. I watch riots break out in the city he works in, with people chanting and calling for the deaths of hardworking and selfless people like my father, whose only goal is to keep safe the very people protesting against him. I watch my father head into the city where the protesters are ready to attack him for simply being a police officer.

I’m not asking anyone to ignore police brutality. It is something that should never, ever occur. What I am asking is that you remember that there are more good officers than bad, that innocent men and women trying to protect civilians are being killed and that these men and women have families, with children like me who spend every day praying that their parents will come home safely that night. I’m asking that you support the officers who never use excessive force, but instead spend their days and nights trying to protect you. I’m asking that you remember that the deaths of the five officers in Dallas, Texas, the two officers in Hartford County, Maryland and every other officer who has died in the line of duty.

I’m asking that the next time you see an officer, thank that person for their service. It will mean more to them than you can possibly imagine.