Yeah that is ridiculous. It's misleading for potential netcat users. And by banning it there can be no discussion about how to actually use it safely and responsibly.

"hacking tools" are banned.

If you are asked about it. The best way is to respond that you use it as a a diagnostic tool or analysis tool.

As for arguing it's not a hacking tool - A person could take something as innocent as VBScript for Office and write viruses with it. Nothing you can do about your tools ability to be abused.