Bob & Elder have both hit on parts of what I meant. But it goes deeper...
Popular culture is glorifying the gangsters and criminals while tearing down the cops and law abiding. Where in years past, even when the bad guys were made out to be the hero/anti-hero, it was always clear they were "bad guys" -- now many people simply don't care. Going to prison wasn't seen as a good thing or a career move...
Popular culture has always done so.
It was like that 20 years ago (God I'm getting old) when Tracy Marrow wrote 'cop killer'.
It was already like that when people adored billy the kid.
It already was like that when Ted Bundy rivaled the rolling stones in groupie-count.
America has always had a soft spot for anti-authority.
Look for a moment at cop shows on TV. Think about Dragnet, whether on radio or TV, Adam 12, even CHIPS. The cops were the good guys, no doubt about it. Dirty cops were caught and punished. In private eye stories they might be made out to be bumbling fools, they might even have been comic foils like Barney Fife on the Andy Griffith Show, but the cops were good guys. You seldom saw shows featuring dirty cops. Now -- lots of the cop shows are about dirty cops, or cops that are ethically challenged (at best). I'm talking beyond portraying a nuanced character who isn't some unbelievable paragon of virtue -- but outright dirty, murdering, criminal cops.
I think that it is also the rise of accessible media that has to do with this.
In the olden days, something bad happened, and the consequences were local.
Now, with large population densities and instant news coverage, something happens and tshtf.
LA exploded in riots when the officers involved in the rodney king case were acquitted. That was to be expected. But because such things are covered widely, Rodney king is a name that is known around the globe. I don't think there are many black people in LA who -when getting stopped by the police- are comfortable in the knowledge that 'the police is your friend'.
It doesn't matter that 99% of police officers are probably decent folks like the rest of us, just trying to get through life and raise a family. You don't make the news. The dirty cops do. Every time that a police cover-up is exposed, the situation gets worse. Especially since even when they are exposed, sometimes the people in charge still seem reluctant to take action. This way, people are taught to mistrust the police.
Even the simple cultural relativism has degraded the place of police in society. If nothing is really wrong -- than it's not really wrong to disobey the law, as long as you can get away with it or justify it.
That too is a thing of all times. I would gladly have been a bootlegger in the days of the prohibition. Suddenly the government decides that booze is bad and they completely forbid it on moral grounds? Who are they to tell me? And who are they to tell me that having gay sex in my private home is a crime? Freeing slaves was a crime too, yet I doubt that many people these days would call the people involved anything other than hero.
This is part of the problem in my opinion. If governments start inventing
victimless crimes solely on 'moral' grounds, then you train people to disregard authority.
Unfortunately, the general public doesnt see it this way. I certainly tip my hat for those that do that job day after day. Like I've said in other posts, my Grandfather retired from a PD, a few minutes north of where I live. Its amazing at how much has changed from then to today. 10 times the violence and crime.
