Daniel Radcliffe thinks we should consider calling all gun crimes 'a form of terrorism'

Nicola Bailey

The cry for gun control is loud, but little progress has been made to change current policy.

In 2016 alone, there have already been nearly 8,500 gun-related deaths.

Daniel Radcliffe's suggestion for how to change people's views on gun crimes? Call it a "form of terrorism."

The actor spoke with Business Insider in an exclusive interview before the TimesTalks event to promote his latest film "Imperium," which is based on a true story of an FBI agent's undercover mission to infiltrate a white supremacy group.

Early on, the film challenges the idea of categorizing threats and following the mainstream definition of terrorism. At first, Radcliffe's character Nate is focused on Islamic groups before he is recruited to go undercover as a white supremacist. 

Director Daniel Ragussis, who joined Radcliffe in the interview, co-wrote the film with Michael German, the former FBI agent on which it is based. After working with German, Ragussis said he has come to understand the definition of terrorism as very subjective.

"It seems to be, at least in the way that it’s applied, a very subjective definition and one that’s often unfortunately politically motivated and I say unfortunately because there probably should be a lot more consistency in terms of how we look at those things and whether we call something terrorism or not has a great impact as to the way the law enforcement community approaches it, the way that the media approaches it, public policy approaches it. So unfortunately the choice of words becomes an incredibly important thing in terms of how our society deals with and views the issue."

Radcliffe agreed and applied the significance of the label of terrorism to the much-debated topic of gun control policy:

"(Homicides are) not all politically motivated, but it instills terror and in that sense it is. Any kind of murder with any sort of political or religious ideology could be defined as terrorism but as [Ragussis said], that has so much sway over how people deal with stuff and actually it might be much more useful to just start referring to all gun crimes as a form of terrorism — because at this point it does always almost feel like a political statement of some kind."

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