[timun]

Originally Posted by Captain Otto

That fact you chose to insult me rather than answer the question is pretty telling.

It was 9:00 am and I'm working, I didn't (and still don't) have time for a comprehensive response.

I didn't insult you though, as long as you're not being deliberately obtuse.

I can assure you I'm neither of those but I'd still like to know where your facts are coming from that the symbol represents corruption and deceit.

I'll just quote myself from earlier:

Originally Posted by timun

Originally it was meant as you described, "what stands between good and evil", but since... about as long as I can remember, back to the early '90s at least, it's also been used as a euphemism for some police officers' "code of silence" about their own misconduct. The idea that "thin blue line" not only stands between "good" and "evil", but between fellow cops and anyone else. In such a case, it insinuates that cops = "good" and the rest of us = "evil" that they have to protect each other from, and when cops start viewing the rest of the populace as "evil" or "the enemy", well... you get itchy trigger fingers and pieces of #### like Derek Chauvin.

It's also something that a lot of fascists and other far-right groups have glommed onto. That whole idea of "law & order" over a "just" society that happens to be mostly white and Christian...

As I said, the "thin blue line" has come to represent the line between cops and the rest of us. As Mickey76 put it:

Originally Posted by Mickey76

[...] an excessive force complaint where the only witness is the officer in question partner and he wears the patch, and I am certainly going to be more inclined to consider he cares more about watching his partners back then telling the truth.

I would presume the exact same. "Thin blue line" = "cop who would perjure himself to protect another (dirty) cop rather than tell the truth".