A woman describes her father, a retired cop, issuing parking tickets for legally parked cars, crumpling them up, and throwing them away in a podcast episode of The Secret Room, prompting criticism online. But her framing of the secret as a learning lesson is what caused the most upset.
“So, this is actually my father’s secret, not mine,” she says in the episode. “When I was little, he sat me down for a life lesson I will never forget.”
She says he told her of his malpractice in order to prevent her from making the same mistakes.
“Back in the day, when he was a cop, once a month, my dad would find a really nice car that was legally parked. Nothing wrong,” she says. “And then, he would cite them for illegal parking and then throw the ticket away. His unsuspecting victims would only find out about it when their fines hit the court system, and the court contacted them because they were delinquent.”
The woman did not explain a reason for her father’s invalid citation of parking tickets. However, she described his story as a learning experience for her.
“Needless to say, I was really shocked,” she says in the podcast. “But I was also proud that he used that story as a learning moment for his little girl. You know, he told me, ‘Treat others well, treat them with kindness, because if you don’t, you’re not only hurting them, you’re gonna hurt yourself in the long-run, too.’”
She shared her father’s secret in a short audio clip, recorded last year, at the beginning of the “Small Town Gossip” episode of The Secret Room podcast, uploaded to streaming platforms on June 15. Each episode begins with a briefly-explained secret provided by an unnamed guest, radio phone-in style, while another guest’s secret is expanded upon in a thorough interview for the rest of the episode.
The podcast episode was shared in the r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut subreddit, where users share police activity and instances of malpractice.
“Did this once a month just to be a jackass?” one user said. “To raise ticket revenue? I’m confused and I don’t think I like this girl.”
In addition to condemning the retired policeman’s actions, many also criticized the daughter’s framing of his actions as a moment of growth.
“So, thirty years later, he still can’t let it go,” she says in the clip. “His story has been a guiding light for me ever since the night he felt he could confide in me, and I’m glad he did.”
“Anyone who uses this story as their ~guiding light~ is a piece of shit tbh,” the user that originally posted the podcast to the subreddit said.
“’He did fucked up stuff, never got caught, and now he (has) deep feelings of regret, that’s so hard for him.’ Umm, those feelings are guilt and you should never feel bad for people who have them after using their position of power/authority to fuck over other people for no reason at all,” another user said.
In response, the woman told the Daily Dot that people misunderstood what she meant, saying that she admired the strength it took for her father to confess what he did in order for her to be able to learn from it.
“People who are negative just don’t understand my story,” she said. “I’ve always appreciated that and I’m sorry for people who can’t understand. I think I was about as clear as I could be.”
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