Ripley, most of that doesn't make sense to me but lets deal with the first part.
It's OK to steal because they do, is that what you are saying?
no, that is absolutely not what I am saying, in any way.
If an artist literally loses money off every sale, because of how their record contract worked out, you are literally costing the artist money whenever you buy a record. Don't know how to make that any clearer.
they do not receive money from it, they lose money from it. What's more, your money contributes solely to the engine that perpetuates this cost to artists, by making the labels richer and the artists poorer.
however, in terms of law, this is not "stealing" because it's all done under cover of the legal contract. So to you, is it perfectly ok, and you are not complicit even though it's your act that takes money away from the artist?
(and takes money away much more directly than downloading, since downloads are not 1to1 replacements for sales)
Clearly the larger issue is that you should not use the word "stealing" sloppily. Do you mean it as according to the law (which includes no protection for people who are bamboozled by people with more power from them)? According to law, which is politically and locally defined, and which can change according to political pressure? Before 2002 in the US it wasn't stealing to download materials written in 1978, and now it is stealing to do so. Does our outrage over theft simply switch on after 2002?
I think the main argument here is a moral one.
I hear "stealing is bad" but I'm not sure what people mean by stealing, because rules of ownership for the results of creativity are culturally (and subculturally) defined. This is so clearly obvious with respect to different norms in jazz, dub, dancehall, hip-hop, trad irish music, etc etc that it shouldn't even be up for debate. At some point, those definitions may be in conflict, and I don't think it's self-evident which side you are going to pick unless you just keep your personal definition regardless of the effect on others or their own wishes.
being in law school, i'd just say that taking a strong moral stand on "the rule of law" with respect to copyright law would be ridiculous.
I think some people are confusing a moral argument based in a certain vision of ownership with the admittedly convoluted realities of the industry.
other people are confusing the interest of record labels with the interest of the artist. there are lots of different issues, depending on who the artist is and who the label is.
for example, in many cases: 95% of the money from a CD sale supports the label so they have the power to (among other things) have their lawyers write shitty contracts that forces artists to make only 5% of CDs, force artists to change their style in conjunction with corporate interests etc etc etc. If you want to make a strong moral stand against harming the artist, how do you measure all of those harms? does the 5% you give to the artist outweigh all the other stuff?
with indie labels, it's more complicated, as I wrote above. But it's simply silly to bring it all down to "stealing" or "not stealing." How you measure the harms and benefits is obviously more complicated than that.
if you want to simply not go against the artists' wishes, that's great. But that too is a basically moral decision (especially as artists can be wrong, misinformed, or malicious). And I'd reiterate that the morality of participating in a larger system of exploitation is worth a thought as well.