Honour is a gift you give yourself, and following a long career, if still alive, it is all that is left. For as pilots you don't design, build or improve anything. How much honour do you finish your career with when you started out by working for free?
It's about professional conduct just as much as wearing shiny shoes and tucking in your shirt. If a company chooses to use your services for free (NOTE that I'm avoiding the word 'employ'), do you really want to work for a company that can see no other way to grow their business other than to pay their workers nothing?
The purpose of a career is to make as much money as you can by doing the least amount of work possible. Any ramblings about "living the dream" will die off after the first few years, that's life.
Analysis of risk is evident in every aspect of my daily life, the way I drive, the time I spent deciding on which mortgage, the type of house I live in. A career in engineering has taught me how to measure & balance risk … exactly the attributes I thought made me suited to being a pilot. But, alas, this thread has made me realise that those who appear to succeed in today's aviation world are the ones who have no aversion to risk, don't know how to quantify it and have no cares for their future or retirement - I'll bet that many of those 100k in debt couldn't even state their APR if asked.
If working for free is what it takes to get started in aviation then I simply won't do it, I'm better than that - I'll put my CPL to good use instructing at the flying club at weekends while I have a proper career during the week. I'll be content knowing that my future is secure.
If you work for free then that is exactly what you are worth as an individual: nothing.