Respect can be earned through repeated professional and trustworthy behaviour - what you are talking about is fear.

For certain types of people, respect can only be achieved via intimidation. Or mean the same thing.

Considering the totally dysfunctional state of American policing, I think we can longer afford to give police that type of “respect”.

If that were true, the appropriate solution would be deploying intimidation techniques against those people, not wearing a uniform that does it to everyone

I am deeply confused by this response. All I did was described authoritarians a little differently.

Worked fine in England with _every_ type of criminal, when police were basically wearing a giant tit on their heads.

Respect isn't given to people who look movie-tough-guy-cool, it's given to people who know what they're doing.

When one of the earlier police commissioners was asked why the police don't carry guns, he replied that it would put too much distance between them and the public. The police in the U.S.A. seem to actively be going for that distance.

> it would put too much distance between them and the public

It's not just one person's opinion, either. The British police is (supposed to, it's stretching further from it under the endless cuts) adhere to Peelian principles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles

Thanks, that page is super interesting.

> The Metropolitan Police officers were often referred to as 'Bobbies' after Sir Robert (Bobby) Peel

So _that's_ why! :D

And a massive billy club they weren't afraid to bludgeon people with.

I don't know how respected US police currently are, but they definitely lead to escalation of violence. I doubt dorky uniforms would make it worse.

this is a bizarre attitude, similar to the one that conflates rehabilitation with punishment and justice with retribution.

>A police force that is not respected will lead to escalation of violence.

Escalation by whom, the police or the citizens?

By both, which sucks either way.

Sorry, I don't respect people who murder innocent civilians without cause or due process. Or people that can arbitrarily seize any amount of your property, forever, with no possible recourse.

Or really tacticool guys in general. They're pretty much always absolute assholes.

Police killings are pretty rare (but unfortunately not sufficiently prosecuted)