On the abuse of language

Maybe I'm obsessed, but misusing words such as "terrorism" really gets my goat. And even when L'osservatore Romano is the culprit, I get awful annoyed at the perpetrator.

Terrorism we can define as 1)acts of physical violence 2)which are intended to hurt or kill civilians in order to 3)instill fear and thus compliance with the terrorist's political/social goals.

For instance, al-Quaeda engages in terrorism in order to bring down non-Muslim regimes and install their Jihadist Islam. The Virginia Tech massacre was not terrorism - no political or social goal was intended, just slaughter. And slurring the Pope, no matter how vile the words used may be, is not terrorism - it's not physical.

Phew, that's out of my system!