They can and do make whatever they want illegal, but you're correct not to make a moral claim about it. I'm not making a moral claim, either, but a pragmatic one.

At the same time, it's entirely legitimate to look at a set of laws and think "fuck that". Just because you're correct that bad things might happen to folks doesn't mean I have to be happy with it.

At the end of the day, having bad laws doesn't make the rest of us cower in fear.

Rather, those laws help us understand that the folks protected by those laws (and the systems that they are using to harm us) neither have our interests in mind nor have any legitimate claim to authority.

So while your "bad things will happen if I break the law" is maybe pragmatic, consider a similar pragmatic point:

"writing laws that folks feel justified in breaking might lead to shifts in how legitimate people see that government".