They werent [sic] trying to be twats, they just were.
What kind of defence is that?! And it's not even true for the pilot!
Your entire angle on this is flawed. The rules are there as a result of hard-earned experience about what is and isn't safe or worthwhile, and many good people have died providing the corporate knowledge which informs the rule-makers. While noone places blind faith in the hierarchy these days, I do at least trust them, when they write the rules, to strike a fairly sensible balance between allowing us to achieve worthwhile training while putting in place certain restrictions which reduce the chances of us meeting a sticky end in the process. If you seriously believe that rules should be routinely ignored even in the training environment, then you must have plenty of luck to make up for your seeming total lack of judgment!