Correction: Arizona High Court Asked but Has Not Yet Decided to Ban term "illegal Alien" from Courtroom

A notice came across one of my RSS Readers titled Arizona Supreme Court: Quit Saying ‘Illegal Aliens”!!, ‘Let’s Call ...

I followed the link and it led me to a site which had this entry Arizona Supremes Ban Term “Illegal Alien”, Then Threaten To Sue Website For Reporting Story, Obviously, I wanted to learn more about it and once there, I learned that it's source was Juditial Watch which has an ultra-right wing bent where you will find writings about all kinds of conspiracies that reinforce the right wing's paranoia and their cult of 'Victimhood"

This notice is all over the right wing blog rolls and you can feel free to imagine how it is being reported and commented, the interesting part is that there are scant postings in arguing for not calling undocumented immigrants, illegal - personally I think that no human being is illegal and to call anybody by that designation, dehumanizes the person.

I continued to search for any entries which were not as viscerally reactionary, it took a little while but finally I came across a posting at ImmigrationProf Blog - A Member of the Law Professor Blogs Network
who does clarify the facts of the matter - it is not what or how the right-wing-nuts are describing it.
Finally, some sobering balance.

Q: Why aren't more of us refuting the anti-immigrant propaganda and disinformation on the Media and the Internet?

Aurora
Here is the post at ProfBlog with a couple of comments:

November 10, 2008

Correction: Arizona High Court Asked but Has Not Yet Decided to Ban term "illegal Alien" from Courtroom

The media report that the term had been banned, click here. was wrong. I apologize for the earlier posting.

Car Gerchick, communications director for the court said "Those words have not been banned from Arizona courtrooms."

"A letter was sent in from an organization, a local legal organization, asking a court to essentially ban the use of those words."

Gerchick said Chief Justice Ruth McGregor's responded to the group, identified as Los Abogados, and told them she would share the request with the legal community and that no decision has been made.

"Under no circumstances did the Chief Justice McGregor ban any words."

ra

November 10, 2008 | Permalink

TrackBack

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/89778/35575390

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Correction: Arizona High Court Asked but Has Not Yet Decided to Ban term "illegal Alien" from Courtroom:

Comments

http://ktar.com/?nid=6&sid=986969

"Reports that the words "illegal" and "alien" have been banned from Arizona court rooms are false, according to an Arizona Supreme Court official."

Posted by: Daniel M. Kowalski | Nov 10, 2008 12:24:23 PM

Censorship!

Posted by: Thomas Lillich | Nov 10, 2008 1:12:11 PM

It is always a good idea to read articles before posting and commenting upon them.

Judicial Watch published the story to inflame public opinion against illegal immigration and its elitist enablers.

Professor Aldana swallowed the story, hook, line and sinker and posting it has hurt the "undocumented worker" cause.

Read, read, read!

Tell McCain to End the Politics of Hate

The Real McCain

McCain and Palin must reject the politics of hate

31,000 signers

Click here to send this to your friends
GO HERE TO SIGN THE PETITION

Dear Senator McCain and Governor Palin,

Time and again in America, people of all races and backgrounds have overcome division and fear, and come together to uplift the country and create a more equal and just society. It's part of what makes this country great.

With an African-American nominee running on a major party ticket and a woman on the Republican ticket for the first time in history, this campaign has seen Americans--men and women of all races--inspired to continue that great tradition, coming together to bridge the gaps that history has set between us in service of our national progress.

But let us be clear: while we have made great strides in this country when it comes to racial equality, we are not finished. Now, more than ever, we need leadership that understands that we live in complex times where too many are quick to judge another by the complexion of their skin or the sound of their name.

In the last few weeks, Senator McCain and Governor Palin, rhetoric at your campaign events has taken an increasingly dangerous tone that seems to ignore the precarious state of our progress when it comes to race and ethnicity.

Supporters at your rallies and other events have used hateful language and called for violence against Sen. Obama yelling "kill him!" "off with his head!" and "bomb Obama."

For the most part, you have stood by in silence. In addition, you have also repeatedly made statements that somehow connect Senator Obama with terrorism. Your surrogates have emphasized his middle name. This is problematic and dangerous, and we believe helps create the conditions that have given rise to these incidents of violent rhetoric from some of your supporters.

Today, we're standing together as Americans of all political persuasions to express our deep concern that the decisions of your campaign are contributing to a dangerous atmosphere of paranoia, division, and hate that, as we have already seen, has the potential to seriously harm our country and its progress.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."

In these trying times, candidates seeking the highest offices in the land must call on the best in each of us, and call off the worst.

We urge you to join people of conscience from all races and backgrounds to reject the politics of division and fear, and come together to uplift the country and create a more equal and just society.

-- The undersigned --

GO HERE TO SIGN THE PETITION

We'd like to talk about the pressing issues facing our country: the woeful economy, rising unemployment, the housing crisis, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But we can't talk about them because John McCain and Sarah Palin have distracted us with the politics of hate and fear.

Instead of discussing the real issues plaguing Americans, McCain and Palin have turned to fear-mongering and race-baiting, stoking the prejudices of their supporters. The situation has become so critical that we've teamed up with Color of Change to put an end to these dangerous mob scenes.

Things have gotten so out of control that some conservatives have come forward to denounce McCain and Palin's hate-mongering. In an Op-Ed for The Baltimore Sun, Frank Schaeffer writes: "John McCain: If your campaign does not stop equating Sen. Barack Obama with terrorism, questioning his patriotism and portraying Mr. Obama as "not one of us," I accuse you of deliberately feeding the most unhinged elements of our society the red meat of hate, and therefore of potentially instigating violence."

Don't let McCain and Palin undo the decades spent fighting for civil rights and equality in our country.

John McCain's Mob



Also on You TUBE and Quicktime