> Is starting a civil war really your best answer to police violence? I have not advocated for that position here, because like you I think that there are bett

> Is starting a civil war really your best answer to police violence? I have not advocated for that position here, because like you I think that there are better ways of fixing the problem--policy, training, and recruitment. That all said, I think we have to acknowledge that we can't use the same moral calculus for officers (read: agents of state violence) that we do for common citizens. You even mention as much when you invoke "the moral high ground", because there is a qualitative difference between an act of violence committed by a citizen on their own (presumably limited to their own resources and defensible only by circumstance) and a one committed by an agent of the state (limited only by the resources allocated by the state and defensible by the blank check of "I'm a police officer"). For what it's worth, I don't have a strong alternative code to present at this time--I merely think that one is necessary. One could make the argument that, for example, officers forfeit the right to appeal in the event of a complaint against them, that they should be imprisoned immediately if found doing wrong and executed publicly if found falsifying evidence. This heavy burden--especially if eagerly applied--would serve to help limit the number of people who merely want to be a thug with a badge. And that's not a great plan for a number of reasons--consider the case where criminals just cry foul to remove officers from circulation. But we have to start thinking beyond the simple idea that an officer is in the same moral calculus as a citizen. It's precisely to avoid civil war that change has to happen: when a private citizen commits murder, it is an isolated tragedy. When an agent of the state that does the same, it is cause to question the validity of that state. A lying citizen is not a sign of societal decay, but a lying officer or agent of the state is.