Library of Congress Caves to Big Amnesty

Political correctness is invading our most hallowed federal institutions.

Check out this article from the Chicago Tribune:

Library of Congress to stop using term 'illegal alien'
 

 

The Library of Congress, saying a once common phrase had become offensive, announced it will no longer use “illegal aliens” as a bibliographical term.

Just because a term has become offensive to someone, that is no reason at all to have it removed from a public lexicon or public usage.

Give me a break. What is this? 1984?

Perhaps we should prepare for the telescreens to enter our rooms.

Should we fear that the dissidents in our societies will be relegated to Room 101?

I refused to be a member of the Inner or the Outer Party. I refuse to be told which terms are appropriate and which are not simply because someone finds them offensive.

Let us never forget the sage yet subtle adage of Confucius: "When words lose their meaning, people lose their liberty."

Repeat after me: Illegal alien. Illegal alien. Illegal alien!
 

The library will now use “noncitizens” and “unauthorized immigration” when referring to individuals and the larger phenomenon of people residing in the country illegally. The library called the words more precise as well as less offensive.

"Illegal" means not legal. Individuals who live in this country without legal status are therefore ... illegal.

What is so difficult about this concept?

The change was prompted by a group of students from Dartmouth College, who urged the Library of Congress to scrap the term. The group — known as CoFIRED, for the Dartmouth Coalition for Immigration Reform, Equality and Dreamers — was assisted by the American Library Assn.

One group agitated for this agitprop political correctness. The good news? All it will take is a more diligent, determined group of activists to restore the phrase.

Melissa Padilla, a student in her last year at the New Hampshire university, recalls her freshman year, when she “decided to explore [her] identity as an undocumented immigrant.”

 

The Library of Congress established the catalog subject heading “aliens, illegal” in 1980 and revised it to “illegal aliens” in 1993.

Aliens do not just refer to people from outer space (that is, of course, if there are people who really think that there are extraterrestrials from Mars or Saturn ready to move into Planet Earth, undocumented and unaccounted for ...)

Though the latter has been heard frequently during the current presidential campaign — along with “illegals” — it has fallen out of favor in the news media and elsewhere, and the Library of Congress noted the trend in an executive summary released on March 22.

More than "Fallen out of favor", how about censored and purged?

We the People Rising have been protesting in Huntington Park for the past nine months.

Everyone of us says "illegal alien" at the podium during public comment, but the city clerk keeps scrubbing our comments, and writes "undocumented immigrant" or "undocumented alien." These are poor, false records, and they need to be changed.

Janet West has spoken out against this poor recording and misuse of the record. More people in the city of Huntington Park need to step up and demand accurate records from their elected officials and city staff.

Will the federal government
ban this sign, too?

Many residents in Huntington Park not only live in that city legally, but they are natural-born citizens. It is an offense and affront to the rule of law not to recognize the legal status of those residents.

“The phase illegal aliens has taken on a pejorative tone in recent years, and in response, some institutions have determined that they will cease to use it,” the executive summary said. “For example, in April 2014 the Associated Press announced that illegal would not be used as a descriptor for any individual.”

The term has not taken on a pejorative tone all on its own. Political forces in the media and our universities have forced the term to take on a negative connotation. They have resorted to shaming and punishing anyone who does not comply with their politically correct strictures.

A number of news organizations made the change as well, including The Times, which no longer uses “illegal” to describe people but does use the term “illegal immigration.”

Well, if the individuals engaged in illegal immigration, does that not make them illegal aliens?

Now comes a sound point of view ...
 

It's giving in to political correctness. 'Illegal alien' is a proper legal term.

— Ira Mehlman, media director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform

Dennis Hernandez, co-director of CoFIRED, called the library's action an example for others to follow.

Yes indeed. I agree with Dr. Ben Carson and more Americans of all backgrounds. Political correctness is ruining our country, stifling reasoned, necessary discussion and debate, and frustrating our citizenry's efforts to fix our problems and fight our enemies, foreign and domestic/
 

“We are calling on politicians and the news media to continue the precedent set by the Library of Congress,” Hernandez said. “Now is the time for all to recognize that referring to undocumented immigrants as ‘illegals' is offensive.” The word is dehumanizing, Hernandez said, and there is no excuse to keep using it.

Illegal is offensive--for a reason. Committing a crime is dehumanizing to all of us, who obey the law and live in this country legally.

The Dartmouth students had recommended “undocumented immigrants,” but the library had issues with that too, calling it imprecise. “Not all ‘undocumented' people are, or intend to be, immigrants, and many of them do in fact have documents of some type,” the executive summary said.

Well, well, well. PC takes a  hit on the chin. If one words becomes inappropriate, then what happens when another phrase is forced on others?

Ira Mehlman, media director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which advocates stricter enforcement of immigration laws, called the change unnecessary.

“It's giving in to political correctness,” he said. “‘Illegal alien' is a proper legal term.”

Mehlman also noted the exceptional role of the Library of Congress — its subject headings are used by libraries nationwide and internationally. The library “is an important institution, and they ought to have some kind of allegiance to accuracy in language and precision,” he said.

Accuracy, precision: these deeply held values cannot go unused or into disuse. With no precision, there is no quality, no standard by which to measure excellence.

 

An effort to change that was launched last October by Texas congressman Joaquin Castro, a Democrat from San Antonio, who introduced a bill that would remove “alien” and “illegal alien” from federal laws. The bill has not advanced in the Republican-dominated House.

Good for them!

Unfortunately, since California is still dominated by Democrats, the state legislature passed a law to remove "alien" from the state labor code.

Unbelievable!