Photo by Leslie Berestein Rojas/KPCC
A student activist's t-shirt, December 2010
Today’s AirTalk with Larry Mantle on KPCC took on the debate (here’s the audio) over what to call immigrants who live and work in the United States without permission. I provided some background while Larry fielded calls from listeners with their take on whether the correct term should be “illegal,” “undocumented,” or “unauthorized.”
It’s a debate that has existed in newsrooms for years, but has heated up recently. The Associated Press continues to use “illegal immigrant,” clarifying earlier this month in its updated stylebook that while the AP doesn’t condone the use of “illegal aliens,” “illegals” or “an illegal,” neither does it sanction the use of ”undocumented.”
The AP Stylebook is used as a guide by most mainstream media. But professional organizations like the Society of Professional Journalists and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists have taken a position on the terms, eschewing “illegal” in favor of “undocumented.” And the social-justice advocacy magazine ColorLines, which last year launched a “Drop the I-Word” campaign aimed at media, recently urged readers to contact the AP and suggest that “illegal immigrant” be dropped for the 2012 edition of the stylebook.
The AirTalk segment drew quite a few calls from listeners, including some who sided with the thinking that calling a person “illegal” is demeaning and who considered “undocumented” more appropriate. Others said they preferred what’s deemed a more politically neutral alternative, “unauthorized.” Others still said they don’t see a problem with “illegal” if being in the U.S. without permission is against the law.
In the hours since the segment aired, more than 150 comments have been posted on the AirTalk segment page on KPCC’s website. Here are just a few:
Ali Alexander wrote:
Illegal aliens are not “undocumented”. Unfortunately, many of them HAVE documents–just not their own, but ones stolen or counterfeited. Moreover, as advocates for illegal aliens like to point out, illegal immigration is a CIVIL matter with no guilt or innocence involved. It is in fact up to the alien to prove that he has a right to be here, not up to the government to show he doesn’t.
simply: not having a piece of paper does not make anyone an illegal…were I to chose not to get an I.D. it would not make me an illegal human…just simply undocumented one.
