ThinkProgress
By Esther Lee
August 13, 2015
The
word “alien” will no longer appear in California’s labor code because
it could be seen as disparaging to people not born in the United States,
thanks to a new law
that Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed this week. The move comes at a time
when undocumented immigrants are dealing with a string of negative press
stemming from Donald Trump’s incendiary comments about Mexican
immigrants and the sensationalized killing of Americans
at the hands of undocumented criminals.
“’Alien’
is now commonly considered a derogatory term for a foreign-born person
and has very negative connotations,” State Sen. Tony Mendoza (D), the
measure’s original
sponsor, explained.
The
term “alien” was first introduced into California’s legislature in 1937
regarding the employment of people who were not born or fully
naturalized U.S. citizens, specifically
about the order of employment under public works contracts — “first to
citizens of the United States, second to citizens of other States in the
United States, and third to aliens.” The federal government’s use of
the word dates even further back to 1798 when
it was used in the Alien and Sedition Acts.
The
state legislature repealed most of the labor code sections in 1970, but
not the use of the term “alien.” Mendoza’s legislation erases the term
“alien” as a definition
for the word immigrant. It will go into effect on January 1, 2016.
Mendoza
received broad support, but State Assemblyman Matthew Harper (R) — the
only vote against his bill — told the San Francisco Chronicle that the
measure was “just
a way for legislators to get their names in the paper….[t]he negative
connotations come from the fact that people are breaking the law.
Changing the word won’t change the fact that folks are here illegally.”
Both
“alien” and the synonymous term “illegal immigrant” are favored by
opponents of comprehensive immigration reform. “Alien” is still
preserved in federal immigration
law and in other states. And many lawmakers have co-opted the phrase to
drive political narratives: In a 2005 memo, Republican strategist Frank
Luntz called on the GOP to publicly use the term “illegal immigration”
as a way to push for border security.
You are inherently criminalizing them as wrong.
For
advocates, the terms are dehumanizing. “You are inherently
criminalizing them as wrong, as other, as not right,” Alida Garcia, the
director of coalitions & policy
at the immigrant advocacy group Fwd.us, told ThinkProgress.
“It’s
not just because it’s derogatory, but because it’s factually
incorrect,” Ryan Eller, the executive director at the immigrant advocacy
group Define American, told
ThinkProgress. “Most of the time when we hear [illegal immigrant] used,
most of the time the shorter version ‘illegals’ is being used as a
noun, which implies that a human being is perpetually illegal. There is
no other classification that I’m aware of where
the individual is being rendered as illegal as opposed to the actions
of that individuals.”
In
recent years, there has been growing momentum to move away from using
such terms. For instance, a bipartisan group of senators barely used the
phrase “illegal immigrant”
in their outline of a comprehensive immigration reform plan in 2013. At
the time, the Hispanic Leadership Network, a leading conservative
Latino group, suggested Republican congressional members should use
“undocumented immigrants” rather than “illegals” and
“aliens” and should never use the phrase “anchor baby.”
The
terms have started to fall out of favor among journalists, too. A 2013
Pew Research report found that several news organizations, like the Los
Angeles Times and the
Associated Press, had reduced or banned the use of the word “illegal
immigrant.”
More
recently, two journalists created an automated Twitter account that
detects tweets using the term “illegal immigrant” and responds to users
asking them to use “undocumented
immigrant” or “unauthorized immigrant” instead. Advocates began
campaigns called “Words Matter” and “Drop the I-word” to call on members
of the media to stop using any derivatives of the phrase “illegal
immigration” in their news coverage. And, while his publication
the New Yorker doesn’t have a formal policy on the matter, prominent
journalist Jeffrey Toobin noted that he would stop using “illegal
immigrant” earlier this month.
“The
word ‘alien’ much like the word ‘illegal’ is an inappropriate word to
describe a population of people and a human being,” Arturo Carmona,
executive director at Presente.org,
told ThinkProgress. His organization was part of a coalition of groups
calling on the public to strip the terms from their vernacular through
the “Drop the I-word” campaign. “The media is being a bit more
sensitive, there’s steps forward being taken, but we
still have a long road ahead.”
It’s about creating a society where people aren’t defined by those societal prejudices
Eller
says the movement away from these words isn’t about being politically
correct. “It’s about creating a society where people aren’t defined by
those societal prejudices
and instead embracing our heritage as an immigrant nation,” he said.
Carmona
added, “When you look at African Americans, there’s a series of
derogatory language and you saw the same type of responses coming from
folks that did not want
to change the status quo and wanted to preserve discrimination against
communities of color.”
Public
attitudes toward immigrants can have a lasting impact on U.S. policy. A
2010 Social Influence study found that the term “illegal alien” evokes
greater prejudice
against Mexican immigrants because the term is associated with
“increased perceptions of threat.” What’s more, previous research has
found that people who hold negative stereotypes of ethnic groups like
Latinos are more likely to support restricting immigration.
Immigration
advocates say that’s why it’s worth changing the language used to talk
about immigrants. “There’s no perfect way to quantify the impact of
that, but that really
does impact how we view millions and millions of people,” Garcia noted.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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