The problem is that I have to pay for another thing just to watch the thing I was already paying for.

Piracy almost always is caused by a lack of convenience, namely:

"I get the service, have a (sometimes very) limited selection of stuff, and have to pay for it, and if I want that other thing I have to pay for another entirely different service"

or

"I get anything I want with a little hassle, but for free"

Until they start blocking VPNs like other streaming services? Piracy is a solution that doesn't end up a cat and mouse game. Sounds like op is paying for the content but it's region locked, so the dumbest form of pushing your customers to piracy.

What's the difference with pirating then? I do pirate when media owners go to great length to make consuming it legally very hard.