I doubt life will get easier when I don't question any established power-structure and just do (or pay) what I'm told.

Or rather, somebody's life will probably get easier - just not mine.

Taking advantage, in any way shape or form, of someone else's efforts, against their will, which efforts and work product were not in public but expressly in private, isn't sticking it to the man or fighting the power structure.

It is just taking advantage of someone without their permission. That's all it is. There's nothing revolutionary or awesome about it. It isn't novel. It isn't creative. It isn't rebellious.

It is simply an unethical use of force.

When that someone enjoys disproportionate advantages in so many different ways, typically accumulated unjustly, and forces the world to follow certain rules in order to entrench such advantages forever, there is an ethical perspective where defying such rules is an act of resistance.

You are right that there are situations where that is true.

For most activities in the United States, in 2021, this mode of analysis is flat out wrong.

Realizing this distinction is a path to liberation.

Your insistence in using words like "liberation" gives a sense of your ideological zealotry.

That’s projection.