The song itself isn't about killing cops, but rather killing the institution that they represent and uphold.
As stated by John Maus:
"It's this whole idea, the politics of aesthetics or whatever, that any genuine work, right, is always a disruption of the police. I would hope, of course, that everybody would grant that I'm not talking about shooting human beings, I'm not talking about shooting or killing a human being, I'm talking about the police, talking about cops, the cops in our heads, the cops that are everything other than us, everything inhuman, that would put us to work towards an end other than each other.
Perhaps, in the name of each other we should stomp that out, we should destroy it, you know? We should kill it, because it isn't even alive. I would never want to kill a human being, that's not what I'm talking about at all, but a king, a cop, a thing that refuses to recognise a human being, that's indifferent to human beings, that's what we've got to violently emancipate ourselves from. Isn't it? I think that's what all genuine work absolutely does. It's a cop killing, it's an emancipation from the police, from the things that would put us to work towards spectres and nonsense? Towards the accumulation of surplus, or towards the fucking...ah, positive truth, or all these stupid ideas that are finally everything other than us. Fight re-presentation. Fight actuality in the name of potentiality. Fight the state in the name of the people. This tired metaphysical distinction, right, that we don't have a better vocabulary within that. Maybe that is the way of putting it, maybe that is the way of expressing the primacy of potentiality over actuality and our language, is in 'Cop Killer'."
(John Maus interview: Emily Bick)
The song itself isn't about killing cops, but rather killing the institution that they represent and uphold. As stated by John Maus: "It's this whole idea, the politics of aesthetics or whatever, that any genuine work, right, is always a disruption of the police. I would hope, of course, that everybody would grant that I'm not talking about shooting human beings, I'm not talking about shooting or killing a human being, I'm talking about the police, talking about cops, the cops in our heads, the cops that are everything other than us, everything inhuman, that would put us to work towards an end other than each other.
Perhaps, in the name of each other we should stomp that out, we should destroy it, you know? We should kill it, because it isn't even alive. I would never want to kill a human being, that's not what I'm talking about at all, but a king, a cop, a thing that refuses to recognise a human being, that's indifferent to human beings, that's what we've got to violently emancipate ourselves from. Isn't it? I think that's what all genuine work absolutely does. It's a cop killing, it's an emancipation from the police, from the things that would put us to work towards spectres and nonsense? Towards the accumulation of surplus, or towards the fucking...ah, positive truth, or all these stupid ideas that are finally everything other than us. Fight re-presentation. Fight actuality in the name of potentiality. Fight the state in the name of the people. This tired metaphysical distinction, right, that we don't have a better vocabulary within that. Maybe that is the way of putting it, maybe that is the way of expressing the primacy of potentiality over actuality and our language, is in 'Cop Killer'." (John Maus interview: Emily Bick)