Not sure if joking or serious… 
Deadly.
I had the misfortune to watch some kids’ football a few weeks ago on a Saturday morning. The behaviour of the kids and the parents was ghastly. Ref was utterly impotent. Should have sent half the team off and crossbowed at least 2 of the parents.
But let’s discuss it and reapect each other. That works
You are Oswald Mosley and I claim my £5.
I don’t think that comment even justifies a reference to a specific law.
So why is football different from rugby? Why does a relationship of mutual respect work in one sport but only an authoritarian approach would work for football?
In my experience it’s influenced by values and players formative years in the sport. In rugby you’re taught to respect the refs from the first time you pick up a ball. At at school boy level I’ve seen coaches pull players to the side to give them a good talking to about showing the referee respect. They’ll take them off if they carry on.
Parents aren’t nearly as bad as they know that just won’t fly. From school level, through local clubs and up into the pros, respecting the officials is an inherent value built into the game. Doesn’t matter if you’re an 11 year old playing for the first time or a seasoned international, you address them as ‘Sir’ and their word is gospel. But it’s not authoritarian because the refs aren’t letting that power go to their heads. They know the less they’re seen the better it is for the game.
Why can’t football do the same? Why isn’t it drilled into kids from a young age? Why can’t refs be less like jumped up dictators revelling in their little bit of power? If you want to change the game for the better, start by building that culture in the next generation of players, coaches and officials.
I just don’t think someone earning £100k a year can be a dictator to someone earning twice that a week. But they could absolutely have authority on the basis of mutual respect.
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The corollary to that respect is that rugby referees routinely explain their calls - at the highest level the video reviews are visible and audible to the entire audience. Football referees seem offended at the idea of that accountability.
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Because advertised footballers are entitled primadoners with 8 gallons of testosterone and a serious superiority complex that needs beating out if them?
I agree, if from scratch you teach your kids to respect the ref then that solves the problem. You’ll note the posts on here about wanting players to get in the ref’s face, be niggly bastards etc. Those South Americans tend to do that, let’s have more of those.
But if parents teach their kids to question, abuse, swear at the ref, they’re shite and they and their kids need sending off the pitch then sending out of the club.
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Cricket has sucked it up. Cricket ffs and football can’t?
Shit parents.
And to really throw the hand grenade in, where is Rugby Union played? Where’s football played? I’ll let you join the dots.
I think the most relevant observation is for kids like me who grew up playing both at a good level you saw many of the players who were awful when playing football were actually completely fine reining in their behavior when playing rugby.
There is clearly an element of learned behvaior, and that is enabled by the difference in permissiveness of that behavior. But as has been mentioned, the games are reffed differently. It is not just that in rugby the decisions are explained, but refs will often talk through to the players what they seeing in real time, essentially warning players on the verge of committing an offense and giving them a chance to get straight. There is an element of collegiality to it.
But it does need to be acknowledged that the very nature of making decisions is very different between the two games. Almost all of football laws exist in a gray zone of individual interpretation. That lends itself to more objections being raised to whatever decision a ref might give at any moment.
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Why are you discussing this game 
Whereas Rugby is a managed fight.
I think football is rather up its own arse about how difficult to referee. It isn’t a particularly fast game, nor does it change direction particularly quickly. There is nowhere near the level of contact, and therefore minimal interpretation of the legality of contact. It has none of the complexity of ball handling/movement of basketball for example.
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Video and audio are available now but they weren’t when I was playing rugby in my teens and twenties or when the game turned pro. Refs were still treated with far more respect.
Whereas rugby players are angelic choirboys?
To some degree, that is fair. But I grew up in Leicester. I went to an all boys state school whose catchment area covered not only some of the best bits of the city but also some of the most deprived. Rough kids who played both rugby and football and would routinely make teacher’s lives a misery were as respectful to refs as any of us good kids. Same when you played with or against local clubs too. The notion rugby is just blokes is quite outdated.
It’s clear there are differences and I think we’d all want it to change for the benefit of the game at all levels. I’m not sure you can achieve that by making refs dictators and telling players to get in line, especially if you try and start by bringing that in at the very top of the game. You need nudges at either end and an acceptance that it’ll take time. The absolute aim should be for it to end up as something players police themselves.
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I’m guessing you don’t spend much time in the politics threads 
Not there now in grassroots rugby, but the culture is still that the referee will explain a decision. The video example was to show the contrast with football’s VAR, not as a cause.
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I know several bellends that got off with stuff at a certain Welsh Uni because they were top rugby players.
Probably had great parents
Pretty much, yeah. Certainly don’t see the simulation and (Union at least) players are respectful toward ‘sir’.
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Didn’t one bloke blade himself a few years back?