Patrick,
You are missing my differentiation between an organized competition and a game just between friends. Even if I were to be in the F flight for a club tournament, I would follow all of those rules that I cited above per the USGA’s rules of golf. However, if I am playing with my brothers, or my regular golfing group, I will trust the others to follow the spirit of the implications of having a lost ball without going back to the tee box.
Do you really want every single lost ball played in every single round of golf today and every other day to comply with the stroke and distance rule. The dreadful 4.5 to 5 hour rounds across the US will become 6 hour rounds. Nevertheless, it has not ceased to be golf.
You also missed my point that I do NOT have an issue with ANY of the rules. However, I am also able to understand the true spirit of the rules, and again when playing with friends, I do not fear that anyone is attempting to violate a rule just to obtain an unfair advantage. I am quite confident you too have those types of friends that you know want the true challenge of golf to be preserved, and that you know none of them will cheat you.
It is like a contract. If I enter into a contract with a stranger, I expect that stranger to attempt to remain in complete compliance with that contract. As opposed to say the contract between Mark McCormick and Arnold Palmer. Although they supposedly never had a signed contract, the agreement they had likely could have meet the legal qualifications of a contract. If one of them were to NO violate some aspect of that contract, but were to still remain in complete compliance with the spirit of their contract, I doubt either one would have felt cheated, and would not have considered the other's act to violate the agreement.
Take the golfer putting on the green with the pin in the cup, and ball hits the pin. In 1950 – no penalty, in 1970 – a penalty. How did golf change from 1950 to 1970 that for the 1950 golfer, the game continued to be golf, while for the 1970 golfer the game ceased to be golf. I do have a preference for the two; however, I have no issue with whichever version is selected as the rule in place. Bother versions can be justified or implicated. Nevertheless either version is still golf.
If a golfer chooses to ignore the current rule, then that golfer best not plan on being involved in any tournament play. However, if a golfer and his or her friends, when just competing among each other and without any outsiders, decide they believe the 1950 rule speeds up the game and all four enjoy the 1950 rule, to me they are still playing golf. (I would also agree that these scores best not be posted.)
I have NEVER had anyone try to call the advice rule on me in friendly competition, and based upon your above comments, I assume you agree that there are circumstances in which you would not expect it to be called in friendly competition, but in which you would expect one has an obligation to call it in tournament play. So I assume you are agreeing that parts of the advice rule are “arcane” for SOME circumstances.