If I retired I'd be able to learn anything I want - but If I wanted to tackle the challenges I have fun tackling, state-of-the-art and involving some nifty constraints and difficulties... I'd need whole teams around me, and a large infrastructure comparable to a multinational company.
That's what I get now - working. If I retired, I could only find it, I think, by getting the same job.
If I'm already working there, doing the stuff that I find fun, in a schedule that fits me and keeps me healthy and safe, and already relatively financially secure - to the point where I don't have to bother with focusing on corporate ladder or anything like that - what do I gain by retiring? At least on this aspect (there is obviously a tradeoff)
Not to mention I get to do some empowered volunteering from within the company itself. It helps that I actually have respect for the leadership, up to the CEO, as actual human beings. Not reverence - respect. Specially looking at some other companies out there.
I have a whole other perspective. But toss me into a meatgrinder job and I agree with you immediately.
Finally, I hope you see how your comment on Stockholm syndrome and snapping out of it was mean and ignorant towards the parent poster