(It's also amusing to see that sometimes shift when they get their citizenship; I had a Japanese classmate in college who was on first a student visa, then an H1B, then a green card for about 15 years. He had zero political opinions for the whole time I knew him. As soon as he got his citizenship, he's active in local politics. It's more about urban planning, transit, and YIMBY efforts than immigration, though.)
Where the hell are you working? I'm going to call bullshit, because it's really not that easy to get a work visa in the US. You're saying 90% of your colleagues weren't US citizens?
A similar dynamic works on sex, as well. About half of the teams I worked at were roughly 40% women; the other half of them had zero women. Women are generally reluctant to join a team where they will be the only woman, and also word gets around about who the female-friendly managers are. So those female-friendly managers get teams that are close to 50% female, while other managers get teams of zero women. (Statistically, Google Engineering was about 10% female and IIRC 50-60% foreign-born, which means that I encountered about twice as many women that I would've been predicted to and about half as many foreigners. I wonder what that says about my personality.)
At other companies like Google and Microsoft I've had plenty of immigrant colleagues along with colleagues at offices overseas. Some eventually choose to return to their home country, some migrate here after starting at the employer.
The main game studio I worked for also had lots of chinese and korean immigrants on staff, but I suspect that was influenced by the parent company being korean.
Will people please consider a moment's thought before using this adolescent phrase? People throwing it around are probably not using it with its most precise and defensible meaning (a la Harry Frankfurt). So the most charitable alternative gloss is that it's used carelessly to mean someone is just wrong. It's a very poor (because ambiguous) word choice for that. I suspect it's usually deployed to suggest someone is lying, for which you need specific evidence beyond believing a statement to be incorrect. That evidence is very rarely available in an HN comment.
It's hard to be thoughtful about using language, and I'm no exemplar. But a good start is just avoiding reflexively spitting out some rarely useful prefabricated phrases. This is one.
(Spoilers: personal observation, it's pretty broken.)
In my anecdotal experience it's not so simple.
I would think a large contingent of GitHub employees want the people working at ICE to be using the best tools possible to achieve their mission. Many are probably quite proud of US government agencies using their tools, the same as if NASA or Executive Branch or Congress was using Github.
IMO it’s a very difficult situation when certain employees are arranging political protests against specific customers of the company, and making other employees uncomfortable to express their own potentially divergent viewpoints.
I know many people with visas that are against illegal immigration. Don't assume that everyone who's not from the US hates ICE and supports unfettered immigration.
One of my main reasons for opposing illegal immigration is that it's contrary to the rule of law. It subverts the democratic process, and makes suckers of anybody who does try to follow these laws. I'm actually a big fan of legal immigration.
But I rarely (never?) hear this distinction made in public statements by advocates of illegal immigration. At least in public, they seem to assume that anybody who opposes illegal immigration opposes all immigration, and even worse, does so out of ignorance or bigotry.
Assuming I'm not the only person with my particular views, that conflation is infuriating. I can only hope it's done unwittingly.
If a law is consistently and chronicallhy broken (and especially if the harm for breaking said law is minimal), at some point one must ask if the law is too incompatible with human behavior to justify enforcement or existence.
I don't think anyone "soft on illegal immigration" is against legal immigration. But they may very well be against the laws as they currently stand, because the laws are demonstrably shaped by racist intent; the national quota system used to decide people per year from each country where very much structured out of fear of a "browning" of America.
I'm much less sympathetic to people breaking U.S. immigration law because they want greater economic opportunity for themselves or their children.
That said, I can't argue back to first principles why my preferred balance of virtue maximization / vice minimization is objectively better than anyone else's. So if we're being completely honest, I can't advocate even my own position in good conscience.
Why You Shouldn’t Use the Term “Illegals” Not only is it offensive, it's dehumanizing.
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/why-you-shouldnt-use-the-ter...
Well-cited article with numerous references. Teen Vogue has become quite serious of late.
Thats true
> for using common terminology in a way you don’t like.
When did it become common terminology? I am 47 years old and don't remember that term ever being used until the last presidential election as a means to vilify people of color.
Maybe I just wasn't paying attention the other 44 years?
Unfortunately any word used to describe a population that people don't like will stop being a descriptor and become a slur if it's used long enough.
CBS 2010: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8xTJ8WCGNU
Forbes 2015: https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2015/06/05/obamas-im...
The Nation 2007: https://www.thenation.com/article/what-america-owes-its-ille...
NY Times 2015:https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/23/magazine/the-unwelcome-re...
Brookings Institution 1996: https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/why-separate-legal-illega...
'Illegal', while possibly indelicate, gets to the root of the immigration discussion...people sidestepping the process of lawfully entering the US because it's too difficult for them or too slow for their circumstances or just impossible because they are ineligible.
Saying that everyone that's against illegal/unlawful/undocumented immigration to this country is also against immigration in general and is racist is a grotesque abuse of logic. Take a poll of people that took the long road to get to the US, I'm sure you'll find lots of 'racists' there.
Have you ever heard of dog whistles?
Anyways, Ive never met someone that says things like this but also opposed efforts to reduce legal immigration like the RAISE act or refugee/travel bans. As it turns out, there’s a high correlation!
An equivalent with your driving example would be "illegal speeding" (as opposed to, say, an ambulance, which can legally be given permission to speed).
The big difference is that "illegal alien" really does refer to a person simply existing in a country they are not supposed to be in, rather than an action like speeding, hence why shortening it to just the adjective "illegals" works. It describes a state of being, just like "asian" or "programmer".
Correct, I have no issue with the term: "illegal alien"
> shortening it to just the adjective "illegals" works
in a derogatory manner
Americans don't, typically, describe people who received a parking ticket, or a speeding ticket, as criminals. In the same way, most people have not, historically, referred to people overstaying or working while on non-work visas, as illegals.
Melania Trump makes a particularly good example for this. Her profession as a model is high status, so the allegations that she worked without an appropriate visa in the US in the mid 90s does not generally lead to people calling her a criminal.
Case in point, I have a young lady on my team at work that came to the US to receive her masters in computer science, and is presently employed on a STEM OPT extension to her F1 visa. We have tried twice to get her H1-B and she hasn't been picked up. Next year will be the last try, and we're unsuccessful she will be kicked out of the US to no press or protest. She's a wonderful person and has been a true asset to my team and the company, she did everything 'right' and yet may have to leave. However if we do the exact same thing to someone that skipped all of those formalities and broke the rules, it's somehow racist and nationalist and practically a human rights violation?
I get it, calling these folks 'illegals' is a bit crass. But it's more precise than calling them 'immigrants' because it's a special case of immigrant that we're talking about, one is distinct not because of race or color or country of origin, but because of legal status.
If you are still here to be deported after your time is up, you haven't followed all the rules, since leaving no later than when your time is up is, itself, a requirement of the rules.
On the other hand, while people who are concerned with the recent border crossers being denied the right to apply for asylum, or being held in humane conditions, may not be concerned about those visa overstayers who are not facing either of those problems, the people who are concerned with the leniency for those illegally present who have done nothing seriously wrong beyond immigration violations tend to be just as well inclined to visa overstayers as any other person illegally present; the distinction you suggest is not accurate.
You consider wrong. Doubly wrong since race has nothing to do with it (there are illegal immigrants of all races, just as there are people of all races on all sides of the immigration debate).
> If so that is an illegal activity so maybe you are also an 'illegal'?
Within the context of driving, yes. You can be called "illegal driver" or "criminal driver" if your behavior raised to the level of a crime (e.g. something like DUI and causing a crash). But we aren't discussing driving here, so no.
> Maybe I am way off base?
Yes, you are.
I can't see the gp comment, but from what you're quoting, I feel compelled to correct you.
gp doesn't say that the people who use the term "illegals" are racist "because" they say illegals. gp just says that it's a comment, in their experience, that's used by racists.
there's an important difference, do you see it?
>> Maybe I am way off base? > Yes, you are.
nah, not this time.
Technically, almost every expression imaginable could be used by somebody who is racist. Racism does not make one incapable of using language in the same way non-racist people do, so every expression can be - and usually would be - used by racists. Words "a", "and" and "the" are used by racists. Obviously, the distinction is only meaningful when the expression is exclusively or predominantly used by racists, and for a reason that it aligns with their views are racists. That, in this case, is completely false.
> nah, not this time.
Yah, this very time.
you seem to be having a hard time with this. Let me paraphrase something that, if you have an open mind, might help elucidate the issue.
"I'm not saying that everyone who says, 'illegals' is racist, but an awful lot of racists like to say, 'illegals'"
> Yah, this very time.
no, you.
It may come as a surprise to you, but when people disagree with you, it's usually not because they don't understand the infinite wisdom of your words. It's often because they understand and think you're talking nonsense. And sometimes - like in this case - it's because you are.
> an awful lot of racists like to say, 'illegals'"
So what? Awful lot of racists also like to say "hello" and "breakfast" and "cat" and "good evening". Obviously, that doesn't make these expressions taboo. It would only be meaningful if the link went the other direction - if this designation was predominantly used by racists. So what you're doing here is trying to imply it's the case, by stating the reverse and hinting there's a casual link, but because your case for it is so weak that it would not tolerate direct confrontation, you avoid telling it directly. So that, when challenged, you can feign innocence and cry "I didn't say it's racist, I just said it's used by racist!". Taken literally, you didn't, but you words only have any meaning if that's exactly what you tried to imply without saying it directly, as to avoid being confronted and revealed as falsity. This is an insincere and I'd even say cowardly way to discuss things - casting implications without daring to stand behind them and defend them.
sigh
this is the second time you've said essentially, "racists say a lot of other things too, so clearly 'illegals' isn't racist". that's not a particularly helpful or clever point.
are there non-racist people who say "illegals"? sure. do most people understand the racist connotations of the term, "illegals"? yeah, most do. does the original commenter probably understand the connotations? yeah, good bet they do.
do you? I honestly don't care.
I pose this question for you: are there other, non racially charged ways to describe someone's immigration status?
think hard.
anyway, like I said, elucidating the point only works if you have an open mind. I guess yours isn't.
cheers.
That's called "circular arfument" - you proclaim that this term is racist and prove it by proclaiming - without any evidence - that "most people" (who?) "understand" that it is racist. What you do is just repeating your original - baseless - claim.
> do you? I honestly don't care
So, being unable to prove your point, or somehow substantiate the claim that calling acts that are agains the law "illegal" is somehow "racist" (tbh, you shouldn't blame yourself too hard for the failure - it's very hard to prove something this idiotic, but you definitely should blame yourself for proclaiming it in the first place, as you should know better) - you resort to denigrating me personally and feigning indifference to my opinion (after all the discussion) because you are so much smarter than me (and the way these smarts are revealed is by mindlessly repeating a slogan which you are unable to substantiate).
> are there other, non racially charged ways to describe someone's immigration status?
Yes, here's one: if someone immigrated legally, she's a legal immigrant. If someone immigrated illegally, she's an illegal immigrant. Nothing to do with race. See how easy it was? Of course, if you tend to reflexively call whoever disagrees with you "racist", it may become harder. But that's exactly the reason to get rid of that foolish tic.
first, it's whom, not who.
second, i didn't claim that it's racist because people know that it's racist.
learn from google, learn from teen vogue.
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/why-you-shouldnt-use-the-ter...
you bring nothing novel or new or clever to this conversation.
bye, dude. you're intellectually dishonest. even worse, you're boring.
That's the best you can do? "Dude".
> learn from teen vogue
Oh my.
Stephen Pinker explains it well:
https://stevenpinker.com/files/pinker/files/1994_04_03_newyo...
By your logic, you are also “an illegal”, because you, too, have broken the law. Everyone is.
But you don’t use it this way. You use it exclusively to define foreigners as bad, as if the law’s opinion about a person’s actions is relevant to their identity.
Actions are illegal. People are not.
This being the case, the situation is generally one of fraud. Some states consider all cases of identity theft to be felonies, while other states can charge the crime either way.