That's why I speak out against attempts to paint copyright violation as other things, such as theft: it's an appeal to emotions, trying to equate "thing I want people to oppose" with "very different thing I expect people already consider bad". It's a fundamentally dishonest bit of oratory.
I write for a (meager) living. If someone were to take my work and decide for themselves that it should be online for free, then they ARE stealing from me. That is reality, not the semantics of case law.