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I said "alien" because it's a legal term and I see it used a lot, including by US authorities. FWIW, I was once an alien in the US too and saw this term in my o
by qb45 9y ago
I said "alien" because it's a legal term and I see it used a lot, including by US authorities. FWIW, I was once an alien in the US too and saw this term in my own documents many times. I don't even know any good substitute, "foreigner" is pretty much the literal translation but "illegal foreigners" just sounds unusual, "illegal immigrants" would be better but then "immigrant" isn't really the same thing as "alien".
Now, using "undocumented" for "illegal" is clearly fraudulent. These words don't mean the same.
- closeparen 9y agoIlegal alien frames people as primarily criminals who are not like us (and should get out). Undocumented frames people as lacking official documentation for the lives they lead (so we should document them). That is illegal, yes, but the terminology puts the emphasis in a different place. Would you say "person who struggled with narcotics addiction" or "felon"? People who were addicted to hard drugs at one point possessed them, and are necessarily criminals in the same way that people who are in the US without corresponding records in government databases are necessarily criminals. Which word you choose depends on how you want the audience to feel about them. Illegal vs. undocumented is just a code word for your view on immigration policy (with illegal being more neutral, undocumented being specifically liberal).