This is insane. Apparently (at least on Debian) this can be circumvented by putting this in ~/.config/pip/pip.conf:
[global]
break-system-packages = true
I would have preferred single-version-externally-managed to keep fond memories of setuptools alive.
It becomes increasingly impossible to track down home directory pollution and config files in Python. Next step will be a Python registry on Linux. How about:
It becomes increasingly impossible to track down home directory pollution and config files in Python. Next step will be a Python registry on Linux. How about: