.....and I'm not saying you're blatantly biased but certainly beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I've watched exactly one Fulham match. I won't swear....but I wouldn't be surprised if my assessment (or another neutral) of their penchant for pratfalls was not so generous.
I love Spurs and tolerate ManU, so I don't know if I'm that biased. Point taken, but I think it still is a valid statement to say that certain teams have a penchant for diving over others.
....and not to be a jerk but to follow up on what I highlighted, I believe your sig at one time also stated that you hate Arsenal. Regardless, I don't necessarily disagree with your main point but I do think much of that perception is because those teams are the perennial "winning" teams.....who are always it seems either labeled thugs or divers....or sometimes both.
There are many ways of handling simulation (diving) that would reduce its occurence greatly. But you won't see most of them in English football for various reasons, and most of them do in fact have to do with the culture of the fans. It is obvious that referees don't and cannot see everything on the field; presumably, that is why there are three referees. It is probably less obvious to spectators that referees see way more than you think they do; they just can't be bothered with everything. In the case of UK referees, they are generally loath to call many fouls, anyway, because they have to uphold the reputation of the league as being "fast-paced" or "flowing" or whatever. And yet, watchers of those leagues STILL think that too many fouls are called, and want to go back to the "good old days" when the league was more "physical" and "harder." Like the Newcastle-Arsenal game, I suppose. I've heard all these things said by Arsenal fans here, so I'm not making this up. Technical skill and physicality exist in an uneasy balance in the league right now. Technically brilliant but somewhat slight players (like Reyes, for instance, or He Who Shall Not Be Named) cannot shine in a league where they are allowed to be fouled hard and fouled repeatedly because the ref is afraid to be accused of being an attention whore by blowing his whistle. And after awhile of all those fouls against them building up, all the time with no calls being given, well then of course the player has no solution but to dive or simulate fouls. What do you expect? Then you've a real problem, because the ref can't get involved by calling the fouls, for fear of being called "interfering", but then he can't book someone for simulation either, because that also stops the game and cuts down on its reputation as fast-paced. Well, what's it going to be? One can overcompensate like Dermot Gallagher and let every foul go, or make little allowance at all like Mike Riley and call too many trifling things. The way I deal with simulation is simple, but it's not very English, either. I see a dive, I don't blow the whistle. I run by a player, make note of his number, and say, "You're in my book as soon as the ball goes out," then come back and show him the card. That way you avoid stopping play, and you still deal with the miscreant. It's not as easy to deal with simulation as it might seem, and it's not going away completely, but certainly there are things that could be done. They won't be because it's just not in the history of the league to deal with problems that way.
Sorry, cheating is cheating. I'm as ashamed of one of my players who does it as I am angry with an opponent who does it.