Throwing a punch is a non-football, unsportsmanlike act. Clipping, block below the waist, spearing, roughing penalties, etc., are also all about safety, some for the offense and some for the defense. Suppose you had a defensive player begin a tackle and is clearly leading with his helmet and it would be a clear spearing call if he hits the ball carrier. Instead, the ball carrier sees the impending threat and hurdles the would-be tackler. The tackler clearly meant to initiate contact with his helmet and the ball carrier avoids any contact. But, according to the rule, a flag should be thrown against the ball carrier because someone might have been hurt if contact had occurred, and the flag is for illegal personal contact even though there was no contact.

Fighting is unsportsmanlike but falls under the category of a personal foul.

The Fed (and NCAA besides the runner) does not want players to even attempt hurdling. That's why they penalize even a successful hurdle where nobody is contacted.

Interesting. That may have figured into NCAA's legalizing of hurdling by the ballcarrier.

The more I think about it, the more interesting. Someone's about to ram his head (with attached gear) into your gut, and what can you do about it? Either take the hit to draw the foul, and risk injury to both of you, or vault over him with your crotch and take the penalty on yourself.

Yep.

“Because it’s inherently dangerous.” “This rule is all about safety.” Why is it more dangerous to hurdle “..over an opponent who is contacting the ground with no part of his body except one or both feet” than it is to hurdle over a player who has a knee or hand on the ground? Why is one more vulnerable than the other? There are thousands of examples where we ignore acts or conditions that are “inherently dangerous” and could be considered unsafe. Two opposing players run full speed from opposite directions into each other - legal. A receiver jumps high and extends his arms over his head to catch a pass, the defender hits him below the waist before he returns to the ground and the receiver flips over and lands on his head - legal. A 280 pound offensive lineman pulls around the end or runs through the line into the secondary and crushes a 130 pound defensive back - legal. The whole game of football is inherently dangerous but to call an illegal personal contact foul on someone who has used a very athletic move and avoided all contact (or virtually all if there is only incidental contact) seems arbitrary and difficult to defend. (I’m going to post another video example if I can figure out how to do so.)

Honestly, you'll need to ask the coaches who make the rules. But my guess is it has a lot to do with the neck injuries sustained by players who attempt and fail to hurdle their opponents.

Here are a couple more examples in this video. Note the announcers praising the athleticism and the excitement generated: "Oh, Wow!;" "little bit athletic, I think;" "tremendous play;" "unbelievable athlete;" "get some enthusiasm back in the crowd and some life on the sidelines." In the second clip, what would you call and why?
Hurdling 1013 - YouTube

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Hawk, save yourself a lot of agita. The people who write the rules have decided Hurdling is dangerous and have proscribed a 15 yard penalty to discourage it. Apparently they see a difference between leaping over a guy standing up and one lying, or falling down.

All the Kings horses and all the Kings men, as well as all the U-tubes you cam muster is NOT GOING TO CHANGE anything. Do yourself a favor and move on to the next rule.

Frankly, who gives a crap? If it's a foul, flag it. If it's not, don't.

None of this is at all relevant to the discussion. Lot's of highly athletic plays are illegal; many of them exciting. The same comments in your post are made by announcers on all those bone-crushing hits the NFL is trying, with good reason, to get rid of.

Or, as I used language picked up from another post in a thread last week, "a poor health practice".

That's probably it. Other things equal, you have to get farther off the ground to hurdle a player on his feet than to vault over one who has a knee on the ground. And there's a high likelihood you'll flip if you don't make it over his head.

I'm not sure that any of the subsequent commenters actually watched the latest video.

The runner in the first play jumped between two players; he doesn't go over either one. That's not a hurdling foul.

In the second, the defender that was being "hurdled" had knees on the ground when the runner left his feet. The defender was athletic enough get back on his feet to drive the offensive player up and back. That's not a hurdling foul, either.

That said, the NFHS rule makers obviously want hurdling to be a personal contact foul regardless of whether or not contact is made. You're pissing up a rope here. If you don't like it, get the rules committee to change it.

Until then, I'll call it when it's there.

Conceptually, I think most of us agree with you...

But we don't write the rules. Coaches (for the most part) do. Then we enforce them. This rule's pretty clear and specific - not a lot of grey area here.

I hadn't, because it was to his comments on the rule.