I find rules interesting.
For example, my daughter when she lived
here would do something, break a rule,
and I would punish here. but here is the thing,
A rule is simply flexible statement.
Rules are never applied uniformly or
universally. Quite often, she broke a rule
and I would look the other way, for whatever reason.
Parents do this all the time. You have to pick your battles.
You can’t fight every single battle, which is to say, you don’t
enforce every single rule every single time. You see it all the time,
I have had cops release me from “breaking the rules”
(law) and others have enforced it and it was the same law.
Rules enforcement is often a case of someone likes us
or dislike us at that moment. When I was a manager of a
bookstore, I would enforce rules depending on who did what.
You can’t enforce every single rule every single time.
So you pick and choose which rules you enforce at which times,
again depending on the situation. Not only the enforcement of
rules is flexible, but the punishment is also flexible. Sometimes
you throw the book at someone, sometimes you, warn,
sometimes you look the other way. So if you dislike someone,
you are more likely to enforce rules tougher, then if you like
them. Between friends, rules are quite often overlooked in
just about every situation. Personality plays as large a
part in rules and punishment as anything else. And likes
and dislikes play as much a rule as personality in rule making
and enforcement.
Kropotkin