From my personal ethics standpoint, intellectual property is a form of private property which I'm against, also a form or artificial scarcity, which I'm also against.

If you want to support a small artist? You can maybe donate to them directly? Is that a thing? Maybe they have a patreon or something? In my case I have way less money than the artists I consume from so donating would make no sense.

Also, the act of making a copy doesn't remove the original, the artist doesn't get poorer because you pirate their content.