Forced Migration- Words Matter

Forced migration is a story that no one wants to hear because it breaks the facade of politicians who use undocumented workers as a scapegoat or as a token for votes and fundraising.

It is necessary to use the correct language to describe the real issues of migration and border militarization. I challenge you to a game of fill in the blank, each time the words “illegal aliens” or “undocumented immigrants” comes up in conversation replace it with “displaced person”.

When we talk about immigration, we have to take into consideration the rhetoric of xenophobia, anti-blackness, and racism that is at the root of a system meant to keep Black and Indigenous people out. To anger the masses, certain media and politicians use words like “illegal aliens” and “undocumented immigrants” to describe people who have been displaced and are refugees fleeing their homelands, oftnetimes due to American imperialism. These words don’t sound nearly as threatening as "invasion" do they? That is the precise reason why objective listening and reading is so important when talking about humankind and the policies that affect all of us, especially those disregarded by the law.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary describes an undocumented person as a foreigner who enters the U.S. and avoids inspection or overstays the period of time allowed as a visitor, tourist, or businessperson. It also describes displaced person a person expelled, deported, or impelled to flee from his or her country of nationality or habitual residence by the forces or consequences of war or oppression.

We are all guilty of using misleading words. For the purpose of my writing I want to be clear that these terms of legality are degrarding and dehumanizing. People are not objects. We did what we were forced to do to survive. As such survivors should not be criminalized for that simple act

“[D]isplacement is an unmentionable word in the Washington discourse. Not one immigration proposal in Congress in the [last] quarter century… has tried to come to grips with the policies that uprooted miners, teachers, tree planters, and farmers. In fact, while debating bills to criminalize undocumented migrants and set up huge guest worker programs, four new trade agreements were introduced, each of which has caused more displacement and more migration.”- David Bacon

Governments have created economic policies that have unintended consequences. These consequences have to be addressed and not swept aside. These consequences are people. People who have limited resources and are doing the best they can with the new hand they’ve been dealt. What would you do if your land was taken and when you went to find a new home you were met with hostility and hate?

Language matters. Pay close attention to the words they use to incite state violence against our people like the folks protecting their communities in LA.