Anyhoo, if the wall truly was about drugs and/or “illegals”, you’d think they’d be just as concerned with the Canadian border as well.
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I didn’t invent the term, nor it’s common usage. I guess I should use the PC term “undocumented immigrant”, but that changes neither my opinion, nor their reality. If I KKK member used the term “undocumented immigrant” I guess they suddenly became more tolerant than me?
A long time ago TV Nation did a thing where they went to the Canadian border to protest illegal immigration. It was in the early 90s.
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So you’re saying you have no problem with a certain team’s name, the Washington R******s?
After all, changing that name would change neither your opinion nor indigenous people’s reality.
Or. . . would it?
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I don’t think the two are in the same category at all. Just like I don’t think the N-word is in the same category of “illegal immigrant”. Disapproving of one doesn’t lead to an automatic disapproval of another.
While I suppose in ones’ mind “illegal immigrant” means Hispanic, it includes everyone, and there are tons of white illegal immigrants as well - including white Hispanics.
I suppose if one wants to debate word origins, meanings, and uses we should split the topic before I get accused of derailing. But this isn’t a hill I am willing to die on. It’s an accurate, common term listed in the Cambridge Dictionary. But if I am going to be policed on it, I guess I’ll have to just squirrel that nugget of knowledge away so I don’t promote useless, petty bickering over a topic I am in largely in agreement with.
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Context matters, including who tends to use certain terms, and who tends to defend their use when problems with their use get pointed out.
Putting aside problems with the term “Hispanics,” you didn’t initially write “illegal immigrant.” You wrote “illegals,” a term that dehumanizes, and a term commonly used by people who actively seek to demonize certain groups. Even when one doesn’t mean to use it the way the dehumanizers do, the effect is basically the same.
Hell, even Teen Vogue knows that.
The term “illegals” is "offensive primarily because it criminalizes human beings, dehumanizing them by making them de facto criminals,” says Sarah Waxman, managing director for the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights in Chicago.
Though Waxman admits the term is not always used in an intentionally bigoted way, it “others” people all the same. “Once you’re identifying people as illegal, you’ve pretty much filed them away as not worthy of humane consideration and inclusion in civil society,” Waxman tells Teen Vogue.
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God I hope they actually use the “Come with me if you want to live (free)” pose for the Tubman 20s.
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That would be fantastic… so I don’t expect it to actually happen.
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Yeah. I don’t actually expect the change to happen at all – I’ll be surprised if and when it does.
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In theory, conservatives should LOVE the idea of having a picture of someone holding a gun on their currency.
Of course in practice the idea of anyone other than a white man holding said gun would offend and terrify them.
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They could always edit the firearm out… but like Millie, I doubt that any change will even happen at all.
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The bisection of Native lands happened to numerous tribes with the establishment of borders. I happen to live a few hundred feet away from one such border, which split the Passamaquoddy tribe in half. Today, tribal members can cross the border from Canada into the US with a tribal ID card (they don’t need a passport like non-tribal members). Crossing into Canada is more uncomfortable, however, as Canada still does not recognize the Passamaquoddy tribe (something the fishery industries are quite happy with at present). Further reading: Tribal fishing rights being disputed again
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He’s basically on there out of spite.
Ok, that is true. I was using it as a shortened form of “illegal immigrant”. I suppose one could call it slang and I’ll concede it’s lazy language. I’ll concede the point that Teen Vogue tries to make, but not 100% agree with it. Personally I think the angle where “it is wrong because it is illegal” is not just a shit one, but illogical.
That said, because of the laws etc, I do find it an accurate term. I do concede “illegals” can be use more pejorative, but i don’t think every use is pejorative.
In this specific case, since I was referring to visa overstays, “undocumented immigrant” isn’t accurate as they are documented, but their visas are expired. “Illegal immigrant” would be more accurate, less lazy, and less likely to be taken in a pejorative context. (I believe one would have to really work at it to insinuate I was trying to insult someone.)
But at any rate:
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I dunno, I saw some support from conservatives to the idea back when it was being floated around as she was a gun toting Republican. I am sure it would raise the ire of some people.
I kinda want to do away with the use of people on the money. At least not people people. Things like Lady Liberty and some of the other motifs we had on older money was pretty fucking cool. I know other countries have things like natural structures or monuments or famous buildings on their moneys. Another would be people in historic dress for various regions (that works better for Europe who has a lot of history and they can have unique cultural looks within the same country.)
All in all, our money is boring.
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Agreed, but given the context that has normalized the pejorative term “illegals” (a context that seems to have prompted you to use it unconsciously), I wouldn’t use “illegal immigrants” either. Additionally, what they do is technically illegal – they themselves are not “illegal.”
Given what I’ve gathered about you, I’m sure you weren’t. But it’s effects that matter here. Not intentions.
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Well, that would add a lot of extra miles of wall - that border is pretty jagged. Also, the northern part is outside the border control zone, so the feds couldn’t have checkpoints there. If you got onto Tohono O’odham land, you’d be able to cross into the non-Reservation USA with your trucks full of contraband and people unimpeded.
Technically, Tohono O’odham is a sovereign nation on land held in trust by the US federal government. So it is federal, and so US, land.
I mentally auto-corrected your ‘illegals’ to:
because I think your point is important.
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Hey, I’m all for it, but it would confuse the heck out of the lazy and the ignorant, that is to say, the Trump supporters.
My point was about the “apparent need” for a physical wall in the first place, not the issues surrounding how it affects the First Americans, which would be a moot point without a wall.
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