While I don't love the current state of affairs, I dropped cable TV recently (which I hardly ever watched) and I sort of take the attitude that it makes sense to keep my monthly subscriptions down and periodically buy, whether disc or streaming, or rent a la carte things I want to watch--especially given that I don't really watch all that much.

That is no longer always possible, some movies just don't release on DVD or Blu-Ray anymore or it takes a very long time after release before they appear as Blu-Ray (as to not take profit from streaming services)

I don't see how that justifies torrenting it but most new movies are available within a few months on DVD/Blu-ray.

(Obviously there are exceptions for things made by streaming companies but even those get physical releases eventually.

There is plenty of movies that are not available to me. They're not available for streaming or as bluray, and in some cases cannot be imported legally either.

What am I going to play a DVD on?

I feel like you're purposefully making this hypothetical difficult and throwing up as many roadblocks as possible.

The obvious answer is that either you own a DVD player or you can get one for next to nothing. Amazon has region free ones for $25.

ewaste ftw

Black box above the betamax and below the 8-track player - you may need to move all the floppy disk boxes on the floor first. ;)

An external USB DVD player is about $15.

Eighth generation consoles (except the Switch) have a drive that can play DVDs and Blu-Rays.