Here's another: They neither prevent nor solve crimes.

There is no evidence that consistently links higher police budgets with lower crime. They will often neglect to intervene in domestic abuse situations, and the conviction rate for most crimes is abysmally low.

Police are trained to see people as potential criminals instead of human beings having a hard time.

Nearly every police department in the entire country was filmed committing thousands upon thousands of violent crimes against peaceful protesters in 2020, and maybe 5 are facing even the slightest consequences

The police are an occupying force invading their own country. You are an enemy combatant to them.

Even if you don't sell them, that idea will stick in their brain the next time a cop fucks them over.

They can kill you and the people you love, and get away with it.

Go for the whole system with:

“Ever seen a small business owner who’s skipped out on paying tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars of wages go to jail?”

They're class traitors who enforce the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie

Every police officer is either a Derek Chauvin or a Tou Thao.

If they're not the ones doing the crimes against humanity, they're protecting the others who are, and preventing regular citizens from doing anything about it.

Talking to a non-leftist, your one liner is already great imo.

You could maybe add "they are worthless psychopaths with a license to kill and total impunity with huge paychecks and retirements yet all they do is beat up black/poor people while claded in tacticool and tanks that costs millions of dollars. And that's their legal 'job description', they all inmersed in organized crime"

But it's too long. Again your one liner is great

"They enforce and uphold the laws of an unjust society that are mostly aimed at victimizing minorities"

If the person is on the left: cops are the first line of defense for neoliberalized fascism and will be the people arresting and killing is when we build enough power to pose even a minor threat to the capitalist order.

To someone that doesn't know anything about politics: cops are there to protect business owners' interests and not public safety to the point that they actually make all of us less safe just to make sure some storefront continues to "look nice" or someone struggling with a drug addiction gets additional pain.

I would say "cops fucking suck" then take a bong rip.

Oh, you'll need a comically large bong for this one line refutation of the police force to fully land.

"They are protectors of private property, not people."

An employer illegally steals millions of dollars from their employees to buy another yacht. One of those employees steals a few hundred dollars from that employer because the alternative is not being able to afford to feed and house their children. Who do the police beat up and send to a for-profit prison?

Okay I have another. There are just so many!

They operate as above the law. If someone in any other line of work kills a customer or client or bystander on the job, they get fired and criminally charged. If a police officer kills a civilian, they will get "administrative leave" or reassignment.

You can also go with "Google LASD gangs".

"you can't corner the Dorner"

RIP to the greatest GTA cosplay LA has ever seen. Fuck LAPD

"When the bad apples kill an innocent person, the good apples always rally behind them. Cops are so used to lying in their testimony to get the outcome they want that they have cute jargon for it."

Because "innocent until proven guilty" doesn't matter when cops decide to violate a person's rights.

Clown

Oppressor

Piece of Shit

End of story.

They have no obligation to enforce or even know the laws.

It's a very violent work culture with no creativity.

innocent until proven guilty only holds up for cops lol

One more angle: They actively target and harass homeless people, poor people, and people of color, especially Black and Indigenous people. Most of their time is spent on specified patrol routes, speed traps, sitting around doing nothing (or occasionally busywork), or going after people for loitering.

They are uniformed troops in the occupying army of a fascist state.

This is kinda hard.

My answer would be "Cops are bad because they're the executive arm of a government that only serves the rich, and it shows by their actions. Cops are the system and there is little room for "being a good person"."

But that kinda requires the person you're talking to to already have at least left-liberal tendencies. To someone who is totally on board with the status quo, you can really only say surface level stuff.

Good people break bad laws when they can. Bad people enforce them.

"I don't make the laws, I just arbitrarily decide when and who to enforce them on using violence which I am held unaccountable for."

Eminent domain means cops can seize your property and wealth without charging you or returning your property.

How would you all explain - in the span of a single one-liner - why cops are bad?

Differs on political leanings of the one another but assuming there's an inroad here at all is assuming they're not chud-freaks and I found out that now mostly accepted gay tolerance works pretty well, so I usually go with "If they made being gay illegal again, do you think they'd not arrest them?"

You can describe their purpose well with their motto: "To Detect And Scourge".

I like a simple "if you support capitalism you support systemic child sex slavery and cops have signed up to be the foot soldiers of capitalism so..."

They're the footsoldiers and dogs of the ruling class. They have no legal obligation to solve crimes or protect people.

Their sworn duties include imprisoning somebody for stealing a mouldy loaf of bread while starving. That's a moral failing (and obviously their main job is to reinforce the wider moral failing that is capitalism).

Their job is enforcing the law.

If you are interested in the law part of that there are different jobs with different titles available that pay much better. Lawyers sure don't have to be great, but that is the path for people who care about the law. Cop is the path for people who care about enforcement, while almost by definition not caring too much about the law.