Memes

That depends, the gendarmerie in France is part of the military, but there is also regular police which isn't. European cops aren't perfect, but it varies a lot by division and country and overall I'd say that your typical every day police you encounter as a normal citizen is fine, they're usually at least somewhat polite and won't shoot you or your dog for no reason. Some of them might go on ego trips now and then with some youth or something.

Where you see more issues is with riot police which is starting to look like a RoboCop army in some countries just smashing into protesters, or some other anti-crime divisions where they act like cowboys and leads to some events where some kids get killed or something like that, but it's much more rare than in the US.

In some countries like in the Netherlands they are next level and you basically don't see them or when you do they're always super nice and polite, using positive tactics and just generally doing public service work which is what all police should be.

Civilian means varied things in the US.
The police are civilians, but they're also not, because they're law enforcement.

Legally they're civilians, but colloquially they're not, because there's a vague separation of public service workers from the public.
Firefighters are the same, because they can also legally order you to do something. You just don't think about it as much because the fire department isn't intrinsically fucked up.

That could be a part of the problem. I consider police to be a respected and trusted role that comes with certain privilegies, like carring an overwhellingly powerful weapon (a hand gun).

That's very different from a civilian.