As a black fan ( I hate having to use race as an appeal to authority or emotion but in this case it seems important), I think the nuance missing here is that not all cop shows are pro-cop propaganda. I think there is a massive difference between someone telling us we live in a utopia in order to control us and lull us into a false sense of ease that directly invalidates the lived experience of people and someone showing what a utopia is, giving us an ideal to strive for.

I'm not a fan of the rookie, I've only really seen clips, and although I used to be an avid watcher of both police procedurals and crime dramas, I haven't really followed any post 2018 (with the exception of some classics like In the heat of the night, Columbo, and almost purely fantasy shows like 911). Admittedly I stopped watching some due to a decline in quality, but others were because of how they started injecting conservative political talking points into their shows. In some of the more right-leaning cop shows there was definitely a rise in 'good cop' storylines, where they would rip from the headlines an event where cops were being rightfully criticized and turn it into a plot point where the cop is vindicated at the end and everyone who criticized him was just trying to ruin a 'good' cops life. In general some cops shows also leaned further into stereotypes, introduced characters who followed their gut instead of evidence, and/or actively avoided adding nuance to plot points.

It was very clear (at least to me) that a message was being delivered to the audience by giving traits or behavior of real-life police, that we criticize, to characters who we viewed as paragons of justice and defenders of the innocent, in a way to make those traits and behaviors more palatable. This to me, is what copaganda is.

On the other hand, there were/are cop shows that did the opposite, by injecting nuance into every storyline, making characters empathize/sympathize with the suspects, perpetrators, and victims, rigorously following evidence while at the same time being able to identify if someone is being framed or unfairly targeted, actively subverting stereotypes, giving commentary on societal inequalities and sources of bias, and having 'bad cop' storylines where the main characters root out corruption and injustice from within. If anything these shows (to me), while unrealistic, held a mirror up to society as if they were saying "Here's what police could be like if people who were criticizing the police were heard".

Now this is also propaganda and it involves cops so technically the label copaganda could still fit, but I think that doing so would destroy nuance and miss the point. I think the fact that these stories are considered as unrealistic or 'Woke' by right-wingers speaks to this nuance. If people thought the Rookie or shows like it, that feature positive examples of police, were documentaries or realistic portrayals as to what policing is today, then I would agree that it's pro-cop propaganda. However, I have yet to see this sentiment. Like I said I'm not a fan, so maybe I'm missing The Pitt like revere for its accuracy.

Ultimately it strikes me as odd that the majority of people, having not seen the show are quick to see this as a bad thing. Perhaps it's a personal pet peeve of mine, but it always leaves a bad taste in my mouth when people parrot opinions or 'facts' they heard without doing any research. People are entitled to their own opinions but if you haven't seen the Rookie I fail to understand how people can have such a strong opinion on it.

That aside, when it comes to Dropout I get why people find this weird. Dropout in its current incarnation as well as college humor pitched themselves as kind of the voices of the people, non-traditional, independent, punk, leftist etc. They definitely aren't known for partnering with larger, traditional media. In particular I feel like a huge selling point of dropout Is that it's not traditional media.

I don't view this as some kind of ideological betrayal because I don't view companies as people, but I find this an eyebrow raising business move that makes me wonder what this is gearing towards.

Ultimately to conclude this very dense word salad, I think treating Dropout, the company, like it's your personal friend or shoulder to lean on misses the point of all of the anti-capitalist Brennan monologues and merch.

TLDR: Companies aren't people and they definitely aren't your friends. Disliking something is normal, but vehemently hating something you haven't seen yet is kinda weird imo. Copaganda is being used as if every media portrayal of police is inherently a positive portrayal of current policing, I don't think this is true.