Since i saw some people talk about the sims creators and how they act i feel that there is a terrible misconception there.
For starters creating a sim is not just adjusting tray but using a fair number of cc for looks and dressing. Some of that might be self created some might even be specially ordered for a collaborating creator (thus you see names like "celeb's name" hair or dress on random cc ). This is enough to justify not to let it for free.
For the legal part of not releasing.. Well.. Patreon is not a store.. It's a pledge/support site and unless they ask fee per piece then they can not be deemed illegal for keeping them locked. EA to begin with created the gallery to allow personal creations and gave the ok for modding long ago so the only thing they could possibly try to hunt would be mods that affect game code. (that would kill the game though).
That been said it's rightfully up to creators to choose if they want to share or not.. And up to each of us if we want to support or leak such creators
Not right or wrong in any case but don't blame them for things that do not stand.