Illegal immigrants should just be refered to as "criminals."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fJ-WL6Os…

This change is elevating discourse all over the place. Loved the following tweet:

"Screw them too. Kill anyone who invades OUR LAND. They ARE ILLEGALS. You pussies need to go with them #VivaLaRazaBlanca"

Made by someone with the twitter handle "Big Daddy N5CAR"

In AP's story about Rep. Don Young's apology the other day I noted this:

"Wetbacks" often refers to Mexican migrants who have entered the country illegally, and Hispanics consider the word, which can be used to disparage all Hispanics, to be highly pejorative.

And I wondered why the writer would think that only Hispanics consider the word to be highly perjorative.

I think illegal alien goes too far, but illegal immigrant is fine. they are people breaking the law by being in the county and no i dont just mean hispanics, whites can be illegal immigrants too.

no term will exceed Wetback is its poetry & conciseness.

A skater is someone that skates. A dancer is someone that dances. The fact that current laws make people feel uncomfortable should not lead us to warp the language, rather to address the laws in the first place.

I think most newspapers were way ahead of AP on this one.

People who don't know immigrants have know idea how convoluted the law is. Someone's immigration status is not always black and white. I have friends and in-laws who depending where they are at in the system are "legal" one day and "illegal" the next. This misconception is right up there with the one about "anchor babies". Thousands of parents of US citizens get deported every year.

Can someone clarify why the AP is also not allowing "undocumented immigrant"? I thought that was an okay phrase?

I would rather have Mexicans living here than then East Coasties.

We should be building a wall on the eastern Montana border and checking IDs in airports, round em up and ship em home.

Ditto @12. I read the whole thing and thought, okay what are you supposed to say? "living in a country illegally" is a mouthful and "without legal permission" would mean illegally.

A little too PC, I think.

AP = PC BS.

Borders, Language and Culture is all that peacefully holds any country together. If you disorganize any of these, you will soon see changes in that nation.

Jay Leno had the best suggestion. Just call them "undocumented Democrats."