Norms are softer than laws, which is a blessing and a curse.

It's a blessing because they are orders of magnitude easier to navigate in the day-to-day.

You can bend them easily because they aren't rigid, allowing navigating gray zones orders of magnitude easier than if you had to navigate the full black-and-white dithering of reality.

But that also means that someone who simply doesn't feel shame can plow right through them.

If we made everything that was a norm a law, society would grind to a halt.