Traditional pirate studies view pirates as autonomous agents and radical individuals，depicting pirate life as a simple dichotomy between freedom and enslavement. This research paradigm has become deeply entrenched. However，examining the activities of English pirates who were active between the late 17th and early 18th centuries in the Caribbean and the Indian Ocean reveals that these pirates often harboured visions of integrating into landed societies and sought the protection of land-based colonial communities. Additionally，the attitudes of landed societies towards pirates and the legal status of pirates were not static. These factors collectively demonstrate that the popular image of pirates has been overly simplified，and that “well-behaved” pirates also deserve attention from pirate history researchers.