HFT get special trading codes they use to their advantage. They can see when a large order is being placed by an institutional investor and use it to their advantage to skim off a little bit.

Even if true, that's not an inherent property of HFT, that's just standard corruption: some traders get unfair access to private information about other traders' future plans.

Getting rid of HFT wouldn't get rid of that kind of corruption, and getting rid of that corruption wouldn't get rid of HFT.