 The term throffer is a portmanteau of threat and offer . It was first used by Canadian philosopher Hillel Steiner in a 1974 – 75 Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society article . Steiner had considered a quote from the 1972 film The Godfather : " I 'm gonna make him an offer he can 't refuse " . While the line seemed to be amusingly ironic ( because a threat is being made , not an offer ) , Steiner was unsatisfied that the difference between an offer and a threat was merely that one promises to confer a benefit and the other a penalty . He thus coined throffer to describe the " offer " in The Godfather . One prominent thinker who adopted the term was political scientist Michael Taylor , and his work on throffers has been frequently cited . 
