I used to walk in a park every night at around midnight, in a big city with tons of police gang units. Not once was I ever approached by anyone. It was peaceful every time, without exception.

That changed when the police started driving their massive SUVs on the park path after 11pm to make sure nobody was in the park. The first time they did it, they argued that the park was closed, though there were no signs saying the park was closed. It turned into a big verbal argument but thankfully it didn't escalate badly. That night I looked up the city code and found that if there's no gate, then the law allows me to walk to the end of the park. I went to the police station to complain, and was told that I shouldn't worry about it because they're not trying to get "people like me".

But still, it happened again, and the cop basically told me "we're going to keep doing this until you stop". So, while the cop wasn't exactly disrespectful, he was wrong about the law in a way that manifested no differently from persistent harassment. They're just trolling for anything illegal on a default position of wronghood.

You're asking the wrong questions.

I wonder if Corona was part of the issue. There were a lot of weird rules about staying in parks during the last 1.5 years. At some point, people were allowed to walk, but not to stop or sit down, for example. There were quite a few ugly scenes with police trying to evict people from parks.

This happened a year and a half before corona.

Really, I think we should sincerely and earnestly question what problem the police are presumed to solve. The most useful functions they serve in my area are to help direct traffic during construction, for which they absolutely do not need weapons. Otherwise the idea is that we will be safer if a handful of armed people drive around at their whim staring at pedestrians. They can't go back in time, nor do their methods demonstrate any hope of preventing anything. What do they do? edit: I should add, for anyone wondering what my positive contribution to this is, that the idea of a community taking measures to keep itself safe and peaceful is not a problem. But also that isn't what police do in theory or practice.

I suppose most of it is about drug and gang crimes. Drugs are of course debatable.

Here in Berlin we have parks taken over by drug dealers and people don't feel safe. What is the solution? I don't know. Berlin's government responded by giving the drug dealers designated areas for drug dealing. I rather suspect they rely on those dealers for their personal supplies.

Whatever it is, it demonstrably isn't targeted harassment of the people already in the throes of addiction, poverty, etc. Drugs result in violence because they are illegal, not the other way around. Portugal is oft cited but for good reason.