Letters to the Editor

This letter is associated with the following article:
In an alarming case, U.S. attorneys exploited post-9/11 counterterrorism policies to pursue and prosecute an environmental activist.
  • Given the definition...

    Yes. She's using violence to try to "persuade". Yes, this isn't "9/11 comparable"; but violence and threats of violence to attempt to force a populace to enact certain actions against their will = terrorism.

    If you disagree, then maybe being beaten until you change your mind would help? Or having your possessions destroyed one by one until you change your mind?

    Oh, that'd be wrong, it'd be like blackmail, using violence like that to attempt to force an opinion change. Not persuading people of the right/wrongness of an action, but persuading them that changing is easier than living with the repercussions (and violent acts) that disagreeing would bring.

    Using and threatening violence, and encouraging and increasing the violent acts to attempt to forcibly sway a populace without debate into caving in to demands. I dunno, maybe it's just arson, reckless endangerment, and blackmail (of the general populace rather than an individual).

    Well, that's terrorism in a nutshell. And a stupid persuasion methodology to boot. People generally don't feel the need to agree with violent thugs...

    "There's a question of whether burning property is really the equivalent of flying a plane into a building and killing humans."

    So either 9/11 is the low end of "terrorism" and anything must be as bad or worse to deserve the label; or this is a pointless semantic argument. Is there also a question of whether using violent acts to attempt to blackmail a populace is a crime?

    Seriously, can we at least agree on that one?