Yes, it is several steps away from thoughts. When you think a thought, you are keeping it to yourself, and FBI doesn't show up to have a chat. Whisper your thoughts to a priest, and seek forgiveness. Don't type your thoughts on a keyboard unless you really mean them!

When you write down your thoughts, and send them across a global network, in writing, to other people who can read them, they become more than thoughts. They become speech, and rather non-repudiable at that. Perhaps if an educator is having thoughts about doing harm and violence in a specific way to specific people, they could keep that to themselves and not share it, in writing, with others.

"Thought Crime territory" is just bullshit scare-mongering, when you have people deliberately writing down specific threats, and sending them out over the airwaves. People who are placed in positions of responsibility and authority. People who are supposed to care for minor children, without threatening them with bodily harm and death.