Here's how it actually happens:

Person A imports a wild caught new morph, proves it genetic, and names it.
Person B imports a wild caught animal that looks similar to the new morph. He proves it genetic, and names it.
Now Person A or Person B have to acquire one of each other's animals, and cross them, because until you do that, you can't be SURE they are the same.

If you assume that they are, you are a bit too likely to be wrong! Here are some examples:

Woma versus Hidden Gene Woma. HG Womas, mistaken for Womas at first, were originally believed to be carrying an extra gene that influenced their appearance and showed up in combos. It wasn't so. They weren't actually womas at all, but were a separate co-dominant morph.

Desert Ghost Versus Desert. Another morph mistaken for the other originally, and later proved to be completely different genes.

Yellowbelly Versus Het Highway--can you tell them apart? Most people couldn't, but what popped out wasn't an Ivory, it was a Highway.

In some cases, snakes have been proven to be the same morph, which is the reason why you will see them listed with two names. Banana and Whitesmoke are the same morph. Which name you use, well, that's up to you, but in general, the one with seniority will be the winner.

An example of morphs widely believed to be the same, but not yet confirmed--Ultramel and Crider.

Now, butters may be lessers. The problem with the lesser/mojave/russo complex is that these animals all produce white snakes when combined, and only the mojave x mojave really shows significant differences. We can't tell whether Butter and Lesser are the same gene by looking at their super forms, because the fact that they are identical doesn't prove anything. Super Russos don't really look any different either, but are clearly a different gene. So, butter and lesser are ambiguous.

Now, cinnamons and black pastels aren't the same--they look similar, but not identical, their super forms are different, and they act slightly differently in combos.

The different variations of the pastel jungle have been produced through selective breeding.. The morph is pastel, the variations are selectively bred--there should be no real confusion there. If you cross a selectively bred animal with one that hasn't been, you will dilute those characteristics.
That's why you see so many 'lemon pastels' that simply aren't. Just because you started with a lemon pastel, doesn't mean that's what you have 3 generations later. The pastel gene remains immutable, but the line-bred traits won't last if the selective breeding isn't meticulously continued.

So, no, they aren't doing it to size each other up, or to annoy...there are real issues that need to be resolved, to determine what individual ball python morphs are, what they should be called, and how many there are.