Over The Line

It is often said that a government will not deal with terrorists and police will not negotiate with kidnappers. The people in these cases are really pissed off for some reason and have gone to extremes to either get attention or are attempting to accomplish some goal. We say that we won't deal with them now because they have crossed some line we have set and no longer deserve it. The implication is that if someone is only a little pissed off, then he is still considered worthy of attention. But at that point a person can easily be ignored and forgotten because he is not powerful enough to matter and not making enough noise to be noticed. However, if someone is really pissed off because they couldn't get help or attention while being civil, then no attention is deserved. This teaches that if someone in power wants to make changes, then big changes that cause people to get really pissed off can be accomplished because reaction to the changes can be dismissed as over that same line; little changes can be validly attacked and fail.