The Dolphins are, apparently, going to more heavily feature cut-blocking in their defensive scheme. Personally this saddens me a bit because shoulder-charges at or below the knee are something I'd like to see removed from the game. They're just too dangerous. We all know how we felt when Swearinger removed Keller for the season and, potentially, put an end to/shortened his career. Cut-blocking/Diving at the knee is lazy and dangerous. The rules may excuse it for now but it's just a cheap-shot tactic, at the runner's expense, and IMO encourages lazy/poor tackling technique. A player who can dive and cut through an opponent's lower legs is also capable of wrapping them up and bringing them down. If the health risk weren't there I'd be fine with it, but since we're talking about human locomotives aiming, full-steam, at vulnerable joints, I think it needs to be banned.
I dislike cut-blocking, but you seem to blur the lines between cut-blocking (done by offensive players) and tackling (done by defensive players).
I don't think there is anything wrong with cut blocking. It involves a coach/player making a decision that exposes an opposing player to higher risk, but I think there are other examples of that in the game that are legal and accepted. I'm highly skeptical that cut blocks injure more frequently than say, someone going for a completely legal big hit in a variety of circumstances. They're also something that is not legally performed on a player that has no defense for the technique, which appears to be an important standard the NFL uses to determine legality of actions. I think cut blocks stand out in part because they're pretty much the only "high risk" behavior that offensive players can expose defenders to, when most other ones are the reverse kind of situation.
Can you give some examples of another legal type of hit or play that directs a strong strike against as weak and important part of the body as regularly as cut-blocking, with as high a chance of major damage being done?
It depends. Is cut blocking going to save Ryan Tannehill's life in 2014? If so, I'm against banning it.