The more we militarize our Police, the more they feel and act like they're on a war footing with the people they're supposed to be protecting. It's no surprise silly little things like civil rights become transitive in their eyes.
Part of the reason that I have the utmost respect for most of your constabulary; they're out in the crowd, feet on the ground with their neighbors good and bad, and most of them without lethal weapons. Imagine that in the US, where most of the Police spend most of their time with a windshield between them and the public. And half of them with enough heavy metal in the trunk to neutralize a tank.
mnem
You have no clue as to what the average police man or woman has to put up with and encounters on a daily basis. And 99% of them perform their duties with the upmost professionalism. You almost sound like one of those "defund the police" advocates who need to be thrown into the fire they just started while rioting in the streets.
Two things - one, the British police see the public through a windscreen nowadays, the days of the "bobby on the beat" are long gone.
Two, Med. I'm afraid you don't have an idea what the police
do on a daily basis, even if you do do have an idea what some of them face. I've worked with the police in the past, been treated as "
one of the lads", sat in incident rooms as statements have been written up, listened to the working conversations in the nick, and heard the real stories down the pub that
you, "a civilian", don't get to hear.
Example: down the pub with a DS (Phil), a PC (Ian) and a special (John) -
Phil:"
So lads, do you remember the first time that your Inspector dictated the contents of your pocket book?" (for those not in the know, a policeman's pocket book will be used as a
contemporary written record of evidence, and as such carries more weight in court). Here are three working coppers discussing the first time that they were given the 'official' version of evidence, that they would later swear in court was their own testimony, not their Inspectors, and this was such a commonplace that there was a "first time" for everybody. This is the British Police, generally regarded as the least corrupt in the world - as in the old "ideal country" joke.
Nobody likes to hear it, but police culture is not good. If there's institutionalised conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, as above, then there's something deeply wrong. You can bet your bottom dollar that other undesirable institutionalised misbehaviours are as common in the police anywhere - racism, excessive use of force and so on. Sorry, but my experience watching coppers go about their daily work from the privileged position of an insider but without the years of socialisation to treat that behaviour as 'normal' and many documented cases bear that out.