The alternative is to have policing focus on community service. One aspect of the role is to uphold the law, but the US takes this to a whole new level.
Here are some things that the US does that could be changed and, to an outsider in a different country, seem utterly absurd:
1. Refer to the police as 'LEO' or 'law enforcement officers', thus establishing their primary duty to 'the law' and not 'the community they're supposed to serve'
2. Protection of police from most if not all consequences of gross misconduct
3. Silly good guys vs. bad guys dichotomy where it's all to obvious that bad guys is a synonym for 'black person'
4. Dehumanising labels: referring to groups of people as 'blacks', 'whites', 'innocents', 'hispanics', etc. (this is as jarring to me as saying 'females' instead of women). Really instils an 'us v them' mentality.
5. Perpetual war mentality: war on drugs, war on this, war on that.
6. Excessive militarisation: cops with guns is one thing, cops driving tanks and armoured vehicles is another
7. Escalation to ridiculous extremes by default: in what world does a police force start a gunfight using other drivers' cars for cover, or driving a tank through a house to catch a shoplifter?
8. Constant media glorification of police brutality and breaking the rules to catch the criminal - as long as you catch the bad guy it doesn't matter
9. Private prisons and convicting people for profit
10. Things like no-knock warrants and excessive use of SWAT teams, civil asset forfeiture, etc.
11. Failure to meet basic human rights even in overnight jail
The list honestly goes on and if this is what you require to feel safe, then this safety is coming at the expense of many of your fellow Americans, most of whom pay with their lives: black people, poor people. Many countries in the world thrive without hiring a gang of armed thugs to defend their laws and treat the country as a self-contained penal colony. We have several Nordic countries in Europe that go even further to treat people who break the law as valid human beings.
Ok and good cops don't require credit for meeting the minimum expectation of a good police officer, and for as long as they don't blow the whistle they are still complicit. My own thinking is that this goes back to the US' attitude to slavery in its formative years and what you see is a deep-seated desire to use forms of slavery as a means to fulfil your own American dream. Much easier to do when your police service is an oppressive force.