tl;dr: Good cops are priceless. One bad cop results in long lasting mistrust.
Long little story: (note:
I never want anyone to be a copy of me. This is simply an opinion piece)
Way back, I had been a volunteer at a small community Police office where people from the neighborhood can come in and report a variety of crimes. For the light crimes, I was given the task of logging those in and reporting it to an available officer for them to call the walk-in. For the more serious/immediately need help walk-ins, those went to the officer whose turn it was to be at that small office. What I witnessed is how good good cops are. Sadly, one bad cop can literally drag an entire team's reputation and trust into the ground. Good cops have to work so hard to rebuild that lost reputation and lost trust. Sadly, bad cops are not given the appropriate punishment and often act out again.
I think that we need the police, but not in the ways that the bad cops feel that we do. Defunding is not the answer. It is holding bad cops accountable and making that process visible/public for all to know what was done.
This post was edited by UAPtictac on Oct 5 2025 02:43pm