Thread: Define, terriorism.

Is it a thought or is it an action?

What is a crime? Something thought, or something done? Where's the line between threat and action? Expressing thoughts and emotions to actual threats and actions?

Good question!
While according to my dictionary a terrorist uses violent acts to coerce a government or community, to terrorize means to instill fear or intimidate. And, in today's world it seems increasingly like terrorism is a mixture of both, not only overt acts like blowing up innocents, but also psychological intimidation: if we don't do these things, which violate basic American rights and maybe against the law, everyone in this country may die any second from terrorists. Thank you Dick Cheney.
Another form of intimidation:

Oral Roberts' fundraising has drawn controversy. In 1987, during a fundraising drive, Roberts announced to a television audience that unless he raised $8 million by that March, God would "call him home" (a euphemism for death).[10][11] Some were fearful that he was referring to suicide given the passionate pleas and tears that accompanied his statement. He raised $9.1 million.[12] Later that year, he announced that God had raised the dead through Roberts' ministry.[13] Also some of Roberts' fundraising letters were written by Gene Ewing, who heads a multi-million dollar marketing empire, writing donation letters for other evangelicals like Don Stewart and Robert Tilton.[14]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_Roberts
I guess terrorism can take any form these days, and it seems the forms are getting very creative these days, but the main purpose is to create fear, anxiety, fright, dread, horror and dismay.

Thank you for answering that way. Is it terriorism to threaten to kill you, or to kill enough to make you wonder if your are next?