Presumably the ripper has some form of contract with whichever entity they sourced the content from, and piracy undoubtedly violates that contract / ToS.

None of that could result in piratebay staff going to jail, or individual people downloading recieving legal threats

Could or should? If you want to download a bunch of mp3s without paying the author, knowing that the author has not intended for you to do so, do you think that is right?