It’s never been about whether piracy was stealing or not. It’s about what the courts have to say on the matter. Find yourself on the wrong end of a big copyright case and your life gets ruined, regardless of what word you use to describe it.
How many individuals have actually had their lives ruined, outside a very small number of people like Alexandra Elbakyan? Plenty of companies have been shutdown over the matter and plenty of scene groups have been raided but ever since Aaron Swartz prosecutors in the US seem to have little appetite for such cases and Europe has always been lenient as far as criminal penalties go. The latest scene group raids that made it to HN's front page ended in 60 day suspended sentences for the offenders which is a complete joke as far as penalties go. Nonviolent offenses that are barely worth prosecuting in most jurisdictions if not for media industry handwringing.
People in general aren't great at dealing with low-probability high-impact events. I think we're also not so great at dealing with legal and economic issues where the effect on most people is tiny but a small number are either affected extremely negatively (by losing these cases) or extremely positively (becoming tremendously wealthy as copyright holders).