I always viewed laws as black and white, but saw “rules and regulations” as more nuanced. I guess in the United States I would say laws are things where you get charged with a felony if you violate them, while rule and regulation infractions only result in a misdemeanor or a fine.

Having established that, I do believe that rules should be treated more as guidelines. I have always viewed them as a sort of mechanism to police intentionally bad behavior. A good example being speeding while driving, which is generally not enforced when everyone is speeding. It’s only when that one person starts going way faster than everyone else that he gets pulled over.

I think they are guidelines in that they set expected behavior, and provide a means to punish someone who goes way over the line. To use your cell phone example: I have been in doctors offices and other places that have signs that say “no cell phone use”, and yet I have often quietly gone ahead and used my phone anyway. No one has ever said a word to me, because I am courteous and I remain aware of my surrounds and responsive when I’m called to the desk or when the queue moves forward. But if someone else were on their phone and they were being particularly loud or rude or simply oblivious to the world around them, the rule provides a mechanism to punish this person.

Bottom line: rules are not necessarily made to be broken, but they are made to be respected in the sense of the “spirit of the law” if not the letter.