What do you think of the Reputation System?

My sim was not married, but having an affair with a married sim and her reputation didn't suffer at all. Not in public, not even when his wife caught them. But the neighborhood brawl holiday gave me a bad reputation. I've not done too much with it so I don't even know if there is an upside to having a good reputation v bad. Also my sims got the first level of the good rep just by helping their kids with homework, just them at home. I don't understand why that would help reputation at all. My kids also had good rep after just a few days of being nice to each other.