It's possible to have multiple 50s with fair gaming, but I know many people who bot and nobody seems to care. It annoys me too. But perhaps SE should have tried making crafting-progression less boring?
This. Theoretically, it is possible without botting. But it's no secret that a good portion of the "true hardcore" crafters are using a bot of some sort. Hell, it's so easy to do, and since SE does absolutely nothing against it (and will not do anything in the near future) - I understand why they do it.

They will not get banned now, because atm, SE is fully busy with reviving the game. I seriously doubt they actually invest power in the so-called "anti-rmt-task-force" or even collect data on suspicious activity. And good luck proving someone is a botter without direct 1-on-1 observation. That's simply not a priority right now.

And they will not bet banned in the future either, because by the time the task-force finally becomes active, they will be busy weeding out the new botters, and not those that botted 6 months ago. It's very sad, but I think those who bot now will actually be the "winners" in the long run - they make use of a blind spot in FFXIV's history, where no rules whatsoever are enforced.