'Illegal Alien' Costume Under Fire

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LOS ANGELES (Oct. 17) - A Southern California immigrant rights group on Friday asked Target stores and a costume company to stop selling a Halloween "illegal alien" costume it said is offensive to immigrants.

The costume features the mask of an alien with a green card and an orange jumpsuit with "illegal alien" written across the front.

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Trick-or-Treat Couture

Funny pun or tasteless insult? An immigrant group wants this adult costume pulled from shelves. The executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles called it "distasteful, mean-spirited, and ignorant of social stigmas and current debate on immigration reform."

Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, wrote e-mails to Minneapolis-based Target and Wisconsin-based BuySeasons, Inc. calling the costume "distasteful, mean-spirited, and ignorant of social stigmas and current debate on immigration reform."

The group said it also planned to send letters to other companies that are selling the costume.

Lizette Olmos, national communications director for the League of United Latin American Citizens, called the costume "really disturbing," reported the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

Target is removing the costume from the site after receiving several complaints, company spokesman Joshua Thomas said Friday. The store never intended to sell the outfit but included it in its online offerings by mistake, he said.

An e-mail to BuySeasons, Inc. wasn't immediately returned Friday.

The article says it was distasteful to "immigrants". I highly doubt that. My grandmother and grandfather were immigrants. They'd think it was funny. My wife's an immigrant. She laughed when I showed her.

Oh... wait... they mean it's offensive to illegal immigrants. Why didn't they say that!" I'm having a hard time caring what the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles says with regards to illegal immigrant's feelings on the topic.

The "illegal immigrant" has a green card, making him not illegal.

The Alpha Centaurians think it's hilarious. They decided to postpone the vaporization of earth for another decade just to be nice.

I think it

I'm pretty sure the Pleiadians are already working for Target.

They mostly started as buyers in small electrics and housewares. They have a reputation for being very cliquey at the National Meetings, but some of that is just jealousy.

Actually, all the costumes have green cards with the same ID number, making them fake and the costume even more realistic.

Target: Saving the World Since 2009

Hmmmm....I actually thought it was kinda funny....

As the son of a legal immigrant I find the costume to be hilarious.

I think it's not just vulgar and unfunny but demeaning to people in general.

I've known a number of illegal immigrants -- from all over the world, from the UK, Europe, Africa, the East, and, of course, the rest of the Americas.

They are here for all kinds of reasons, from escape from persecution, torture, or death in their homelands, to simple economic survival.

I've never met an illegal who wanted to be an illegal. (OK, maybe one guy from East London. He was a spikey individualist, no question.) You'll see a lot of numbers flung around by both sides but if one really looks at them, it's clear that most illegal individuals are net contributors in the form of efficient work (low pay, high productivity), payroll taxes paid in and services (like SS payments and tax refunds, among others) not taken in.

But, hey, let's put a face on this...

My buddy's mom and dad came up from Mexico to try to earn a decent living in the early 60s when times were more than hard in the small town in Mexico they came from. They worked, paid wage taxes, eventually bought a home and paid property taxes. The whole time, they never took anything from the government (afraid to tip their illegal status).

My pal and his three brothers all went into the US Army or Navy and became noncom officers. My buddy was a tank commander in the 80s. His little brother served in both Iraq wars (even though he was greatly disillusioned by the first one). His other brother served in the gulf during the second war with the Navy.

My pal is a communications tech specialist with a major communications company and is married to a police officer. Their middle daughter just graduated from Rutgers Law.

My friend's mom eventually made the move to gain legal status and begin the citizenship process during the amnesty process signed into law under Ronald Reagan.

When you make fun of illegal aliens, you're making fun of my pal's mom.

And when you do that you've pretty much drawn a line in the sand between people like my buddy and his battle hardened brothers (not to mention guys like me who know and respect them and their mom) and yourself.

Go ahead and do that if you want a cheap, vulgar laugh at the expense of decent, hardworking folks who weren't as lucky as you by virtue of location of their birth -- but know where you stand -- what enemies you're making -- and how you have demeaned yourself with a display of shallow, cruel humor.

I understand the reasoning that many of them come here, and that they want a better life for them and their families.

However,

The costume made me lol. I have seen way more offensive costumes

"Illegal aliens have always been a problem in the United States. Ask any Indian". -Robert Orben, magician and author (b. 1927)

The fact that this is a news story is the entire problem with this country. This Politically correct BS is out of control.

My grandfather, a quite conservative guy from most perspectives -- and certainly a lifelong Republican (although it was a hugely different party in those days -- he considered himself very much a disciple of Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt -- and the policies and stance of the contemporary GOP are pretty much anathema to the ideals of Abe and Teddy), told us his own grandfather arrived in the US in the Philadelphia area in the 1820s, quite likely illegal in a wave of immigration that was occurring at that time (the same wave of immigration that fostered the extremely virulent anti-Irish. anti-Catholic sentiments that existed in many communities for many decades to come).

My grandfather grew up among Pennsylvania Dutch, German, and Jews, and learned German, some Dutch, and some Yiddish as a matter of growing up.

When, a master's degree in chemical engineering under his belt, he brought his young former schoolteacher wife (who, herself, had a four year degree, unusual for a woman in those days) and his first son to California around 1914, the first thing he did was begin to learn Spanish.

As he explained it to me:

You're going to run into a lot of people who look down on Mexicans and Mexican culture. They're acting out of hate, fear, and ignorance for the most part. Mexicans are like everyone else -- maybe a little harder working, even though they're frequently portrayed as lazy. This land, California, used to belong to Mexico and it was effectively stolen from Mexico. Please remember to respect your California history and respect Mexican-Americans, Mexicans, and Mexican culture.

And then he would laugh and say, Of course, the Spanish stole Mexico and California and the Southwest from the Indians.

Bingo.

Wow.

The entire problem with this country.

Damn, that's some kind of insight you've got there, jack.

Sheesh. WAI

blue2blue,

I usually agree with your posts and I have a lot of respect for you as a contributor to this forum. You are very insightful and I've gained a lot of information from things you have posted in the past.

However, and with all due respect, I think you are way off. In my opinion, for you to tell me or anyone else here who laughs at the costume that we are making enemies and are basically cruel and shallow for laughing at what you call cruel and shallow humor is 100% wrong.

My wife came here on a visitors visa from Venezuela. She started school and it switched to a student visa. But she did some illegal things that could have gotten her in to big trouble and also deported before we got married. Her sister, brother in law, and their first son were illegal here for almost 10 years before they finally got "legal". My wife and I think the costume is hilarious. So does her sister and brother in law.

We also have other friends from Venezuela who are here illegally. We have worked with and become friends with many illegal immigrants since we have been in Atlanta.

I'm not a cruel or shallow person nor is my wife or anyone in her family. No is anyone in my family who came here years ago illegally. You're making a very broad statement about people who may find it funny although you don't think it's right for a costume

We have a HUGE problem in this country right now. EVERYONE is offended by something. The words "racist" and "sexist" are being thrown around as much as the word "love" is. Their meanings have changed quite a bit too. They usually mean nothing these days.

The bottom line is, you CHOOSE to be offended by what you hear or see. You don't have an "offensive gene" that others lack. When someone chooses to pay $10 for a movie and gets offended, it was their choice. When someone turns on the tv and gets offended, it's their choice. When someone reads a book or an article, they have a choice to be offended or not. I could roam thru this forum alone and find a billion things I could be offended about if I choose to. And I'm sure some of your 15,600+ posts have posted something "offensive" to someone.

The biggest problem I see is that their is no communication between the offensive and the offenders (or any 2 opposing sides of thinking of anything from politics to religion to everything in between). Everyone in the media reports the other side's talking points, but the 2 distinct points of view are RARELY discussed one on one to come to any understanding. And that just creates a cluster{censored}. People end up "hating" the people they accuse of hating. And that makes no sense.

Humor is necessary to get thru this life. Especially these days. I find all kinds of humor funny. I laugh really hard and all kinds of jokes. I think this costume is funny. I think racial humor is funny. I think sexist humor is funny. I get made fun of a lot by my friends and family and I think it's funny. And you know what, their isn't a cruel or shallow bone in my body, nor my wife's. I haven't demeaned myself at all for finding humor in everything. So don't tell me that I have or you just might offend me.

I choose to be offended by cruelty, paranoia, prejudice, greed and small-minded hatefulness.

If others get a laugh out of that, it's their business, I guess.

However, that doesn't mean I'm going to reserve judgment -- or comment -- on the smallness of spirit and mind that they evidence.

I just saw the news on CNN. I think it's fuggin funny.

Well, although you are basically judging me for laughing at this, I'm still not offended.

I will defend your right to speak your mind although I disagree with you. I'm more concerned about fascism than if you are offended or not by something.

BTW, passing judgement on others is no way to solve anything is it? Instead of being offended, why not find ways to help the people who might offend you? We are all products of our environment. You said yourself that there are "decent, hardworking folks who weren't as lucky as you by virtue of location of their birth". Well, hate---real hate--is taught or learned at a young age. So is it their fault that they grew up not being taught proper values?

Hey, I totally get where you're coming from. And I have met a couple of women who have been involuntarily forced here as a result of sexual trafficking, perhaps one of the more hideous ways to become an illegal immigrant. This is an area, btw, in which I helped a non-profit out for several years.

And I don't know whether this makes me mean or cruel or what, but I actually found the costume kinda funny. I mean, not hilarious, but amusing. It doesn't target any particular group of people, and is almost a kind of "District 9" sort of thing. Still, though, I get where you're coming from, and hope that you know that a lot of people who found it amusing weren't coming at it from the angle of hating illegal immigrants or not understanding that many flee persecution or war.

You just did, didn't you? How can you participate on an honest forum without expressing your feelings?

It seems to me that the greatest single enemy of real democracy is censorship.

If what someone relates does not hurt you directly, what right does ANYONE have to censor opinion.

I am personally disgusted by the state of affairs within the United States with respect people taking offense too easily. People are turning into thin skinned pansies with their butthurt mentality.

The United States is presently not a country, it's more of convenience store. The Politically Correct mentality is the number one reason this sort of thing is perpetuated and built upon.

Stepping a short distance from personal specifics...

I'll certainly defend someone's First Ammendment right to reveal themselves as small-minded and hateful. No problem. I'll defend the right of nazis and Klansmen to speak their piece.

And if one wants to make such a costume and try to sell it, I'll defend his economic right to try to make a buck off of other small-minded, hateful people.

I'm very much a civil libertarian: I firmly support someone's right to make themselves look like fools, assholes, or nazis.

And just as I support the right to make and try to sell such costumes, I also support a company or individual's right to not trade in such items -- just as I support the right of citizens and consumers to apply economic or social pressure against such endeavors.

In what fashion have I tried to censor anyone?

I think I've made it extremely clear that I believe folks have a right to express themselves -- just as I have.

I'm not silencing anyone by calling their actions as I see them.

I think you and some of your like-minded fellows in this thread are seriously confused about just what censorship is.

If I castigate you for what you have said, it' is a far different thing from me pulling you off your soapbox and silencing you.

The cure for bad speech is more speech.

And that is what you are getting here.

Get that straight.