While not quite true, it’s a good sentiment.
Don’t pirate books, for example, because while it does hurt the publisher, it hurts the author more, since they’re only paid by their direct sales numbers. Get the book from a library instead, since that drives a sale, supports a public service, and is free to you. (The exception being textbooks. The authors have usually already been paid all they’re ever going to get, if they got paid at all, and the publisher rakes in an obscene profit.)
Don’t pirate indie stuff, whether it’s movies, books, music, art, video games, whatever. If it’s indie, you are directly hurting a creative who just wanted to put something nice into the world, and not being able to eat directly impacts their ability to make more nice things. Caution: certain industries like video games and music are very volatile, and companies that used to be indie might not be anymore but might still be cruising on that indie cred. Similarly, a well-known and well-loved studio you’ve been a fan of for years might seem huge to you but is actually still just a couple schmucks barely scraping by. Look into a company, see how big it is, and if it’s a subsidiary of something larger. If it’s just a few people, don’t steal, but if it’s actually a multi-million dollar company with several dozen employees, yeah, it’s probably fine.
Do pirate from the giant names: Disney, EA, Activision, Warner, Sony, major tv networks, etc. It’s almost guaranteed that the people who actually worked on the project were paid terribly, have gotten all they’re going to get from it, and the company is bringing in so many billions of dollars with each project that you won’t make a dent.
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