In times past, consequences for terrible behavious could be swift, unrelenting, and unmerciful. When past societies thought it was a good idea to be married and faithful, it was because if you got syphillis, everybody got syphillis and it could mean certain death for the entire community. So yeah, your community was very much invested in trying to ensure that people practiced behavious that didn’t have serious consequences.
Now, for example, when AIDS first revealed itself, if you got it, you’d die a horrible death with 3 years. So there was a lot of pressure within the gay and drug communities to change their behaviours to minimize the chances of catching it and spreading it.
However, now that we’ve developed treatments that allows somebody to live 25 years with it, many gays and druggies have resumed former dangerous behaviours without a care in the world.
The AIDS treatment was put into high-gear. Imagine if we had spent as much money on trying to prevent cholera or malaria or typhoid which kills millions more...