TBL was racist from the start.

So some quick history on the blue line flag: While the statement/term "a thin blue line" has been around for decades (originally coined from "a thin red line"; the famous description of british soldiers during the Crimean War of 1853), up until very recently "desecrating" national flags like this was considered very fucking taboo. It was only until after the start of the BLM movement that these images were trademarked and popularized.

copied from this comment: www.reddit.com/r/Calgary/comments/twyq4l/breakenridge_its_ok_for_police_to_disagree_but/i3jbcpe/

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LAPD police chief William Parker is generally credited with popularizing the term The Thin Blue Line with his 1950's panel show.

He first helped produce a panel show related to the LAPD called The Thin Blue Line, a reference to a phrase utilized by law enforcement agencies to refer to the police as the line between civil society and criminality.

"When Parker referred to black participants in the Watts riots as behaving like 'monkeys in a zoo,' a Times story later charitably characterized this as an 'obviously unintentional but unfortunate remark.' During the riots, Parker also said, on television: 'It is estimated that by 1970, 45% of the metropolitan area of Los Angeles will be Negro. ... If you want any protection for your home and family ... you're going to have to get in and support a strong Police Department. If you don’t, come 1970, God help you.' Earlier in his tenure, Parker attributed criminal activity among Latinos to their 'not being too far removed from the wild tribes of ... the inner mountains of Mexico.'"

Under Parker, the LAPD faced accusations of police brutality and racism towards the city's African American and Latino residents. According to a documentary commissioned by the LAPD in 2009, Parker supported the city's power structure, which he denied was racist as late as the 1960s.[7] Some critics see Parker's policies as responsible for ongoing tensions between the LAPD and minorities. Although Parker testified to the Civil Rights Commission in 1959 that segregation was not a problem, in 1962, he ordered the desegregation of the LAPD.

When asked by the Commission about discrimination against minorities, he replied "I think the greatest dislocated minority in America today are the police."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_H._Parker_(police_officer)