But why can't pvp be consentual?
Because it would result in a serious deviation from Frontier's vision, which, despite all the compromises they've made, still pays lip service to verisimilitude.
Having to opt-in to PvP means the default is opting out of a plausible, immersive, experience.
Indeed even having the game distinguish PvP combat from any other kind of combat is already a step to far, IMO.
It's a game trying to simulate the experience of a Pilot's Federation Commander in the Elite universe.
Having one's weapons refusing to fire, or suspending the setting's natural laws of physics because another CMDR could be harmed, is not conducive to this.
We can solve the issue by either making the game realistic or fun.
Completely, emphatically, disagree.
In a game like this, you cannot sacrifice verismilitude and still have fun. They go hand in hand. The less real the game world would seem from my CMDR's perspective, the more inconsistency interjected, the less entertaining the game can be.
The whole problem is that Elite, unlike pretty much every multiplayer game I've ever played punishes you for dying. And not just a little bit, it punishes you hard. And it doesn't reward you for winning either. Your reward is simply not being punished for losing. Elite's like a Japanese game show.
Every MMO I've really enjoyed was far more punishing for 'death' than
Elite: Dangerous.
It's difficult to get shot down in ED and when you do, your CMDR loses almost nothing unless you happen to have a significant quantity of exploration data or are playing a fool who didn't maintain enough for a rebuy.
Your opinion, and one that Frontier disagrees with.