2. at a higher level, threatening violence is a crime because the underlying act (committing violence) is also a crime. threatening to do a legal act is largely legal. it's not illegal to threaten reporting to the authorities, for instance.
Just pointing out the absurdity of it. I would much rather get punched in the face than serve 20 years in prison, but it is illegal to threaten the former, but perfectly fine to threaten the latter.
>I would much rather get punched in the face than serve 20 years in prison, but it is illegal to threaten the former, but perfectly fine to threaten the latter.
How about you don't do the action that makes you punishable with 20 years in prison?
On a more practical level, if someone is breaking into your house, should it be illegal to tell them to stop, on pain of you calling the police which presumably would cause them to be incarcerated?
> On a more practical level, if someone is breaking into your house, should it be illegal to tell them to stop, on pain of you calling the police which presumably would cause them to be incarcerated?
Not a lawyer, but there's a fine line between extortion and not-extortion.
It's not extortion when you're making the threat to either stop an illegal behavior or secure something you already have rights to. Like, "I'm calling the cops if you don't return the kids on the time/date we agreed on in the goddamn divorce papers" is not extortion, because you have a legitimate claim to defend.
It is extortion when you're trying to use the threat of law enforcement as a means of engineering consent or coercing someone into doing something. Like, "I'm going to call the cops and tell them about your shoplifting unless you send me nudes/pay me $500/keep your mouth shut." You can't leverage withheld knowledge of a crime as a means of controlling someone. Otherwise it opens the door to "Remember that time you raped me? You need to do me another favor to make it right"-type of arrangements.
The first example would be extortion if the kids were returned late but it was not reported, and the other party continued threatening to report it after the fact to enforce future compliance.
"It would be legitimate" is just an assertion. The entire debate is about what is legitimate and what is not. You're supposed to be saying why things are or are not legitimate, either legally or morally.
Sure, but if I shoot someone in self defense, there will be an investigation and I have to show why I thought it was legitimate. If a lawyer writes a baseless threatening letter, at the very least I should be able to have the bar association investigate.
The person sending the letter also doesn't have a prison nor the power to put anyone in it. It is a persuasive legal letter stating someone's opinion about what someone else could potentially do.
A more equal comparison might be "If you tease a gorilla they might seriously hurt you"
1. threatening violence is explicitly a crime
2. at a higher level, threatening violence is a crime because the underlying act (committing violence) is also a crime. threatening to do a legal act is largely legal. it's not illegal to threaten reporting to the authorities, for instance.