I think you’re parsing “the” too literally - plenty of Americans would say the same thing verbatim, too, without literally assuming the existence of one police force. Broad generalizations about American policing are reasonable - that’s why we can talk about “police reform”, and why the Fraternal Order of Police exists as an American organization. (I say this as a resident of a bright blue city with a police department under a federal consent decree, and with a police union founded by a card carrying white supremacist… who is perfectly capable of distinguishing that from ICE and BORTAC.)
> plenty of Americans would say the same thing verbatim, too, without literally assuming the existence of one police force
They're also wrong to do so, because police forces vary widely by jurisdiction and cannot be generalized. I don't only object to people from other countries doing it, it's just particularly uninformed when they do.
I say this as a resident of a small city with a police force that has never had any controversy whatsoever, but whose officers feel acutely the generalized hatred directed at everyone in blue that has become vogue in a large segment of the country.
Just because your police forces are awful doesn't mean they all are.
I'm making no claims about the quality of any police force in particular other than the one in my city. I'm only arguing that you can't generize from one to all and that the widespread criticism of "the police" without specifying which department or agency you're talking about is both imprecise and harmful.
