That's just what you do when you have a monopoly. Your customers can't go anywhere else to get your product, so it doesn't matter as much how you treat them.

It's a monopoly without lockin, though. It's entirely possible for customers to just stop being customers, which seems like the likely result of abusive behavior.

The same could be said of religion. But people seem to have a pretty strong need to participate in that kind of thing. They often make it a very strong part of their identity.

So it's not entirely unlike an addiction.