Hacking causes much greater harm than does blowing up garbage cans. Playing with explosives doesn't require damaging someone else's property and is not necessarily a crime.
Then: Kids with firecrackers, saltpeter and sugar all in varoius forms and fun until you burned yourself or blew off the tip of your finger.
Today, that would be considered borderline terrorist activites.
Today, kids surf on their neighbor's unsecured WiFi connection, scan unsecured IP addresses to inflitrate and engage in peer to peer file trading to fill their IPod with illegally gained songs.
All technically "illegal" but morally justifiable in their own eyes as everyone else is doing it too.
The ATF would beg to differ and snooping via computer is not always data destructive.
Explosives by their very nature "blow things up".