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Seeing you throw up this stream of flimsy arguments makes me suspect that the current equilibrium in the West (of most people's believing it is futile to have social norms against sexual behavior) is held in place mainly by motivated cognition.

In other words, reading your comment made me less sympathetic to your position.

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It’s futile to expect perfect compliance with social norms, especially when our evolved biological drives are basically:

1. Breathe

2. Eat

3. Procreate

with everything else being a fraction as powerful as those.

You're only arguing the punishment for taboo violation isn't harsh enough.

Using punishments and taboos to control these things does not work. You're not incentivizing 'good behavior', you're incentivizing not getting caught--not to mention that, inevitably, the power structure that forms around these taboos starts rewarding people who punish others with the ability to do the taboo themselves.

You're only arguing that all lies would end if all lying was an immediate death sentence.

There are consequences to doing any of those activities in excess.

Breathing too fast = hyperventilating

Eating too much = obesity

Procreating with too many partners = likely sexually transmitted infections

I agree that abstinence is not the answer, but safe sex with fewer partners is.

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