“Terrorist” is mostly a label used by Western media and governments for political and propaganda purposes.
That is, ironically, the megacorporate news media and several politicians and elements of the US government have used fear of those they label terrorists as a political propaganda weapon, and a way to generate popular agreement for wars, violence, security measures and erosion of human rights, and so consolidate even more wealth and power into the military-industrial complex, the oil industry, and the creation of new security and intelligence gathering industries.
This is what I mostly think of first when I hear “terrorist” – I think of the propaganda and the ironic use of military force “against terrorists”, and how the Orwellian US “War on Terror” has killed and terrorized and alienated so many innocent people, and how that inspires more hatred toward to US.