Letter from Mary Anne Whelan
Don’t Use the Word ‘Undocumented’
The editorial writer of your April 9 issue (“National Issues Hitting Home”) apparently does not understand what is wrong with referring to a 20-year-old man who purveys child pornography as an “undocumented immigrant,” so let me explain.
Individuals are responsible for their own actions. They do not exemplify a larger group, unless they say so (and not necessarily even then). Shylock does not represent all Jews: To imply that he does, by thus referring to him, helps to validate the antisemitism of those who are thus inclined.
In the same April 9 issue, a man charged with repetitive rape, and whom one may infer was a born American, and a citizen, does not make all American male citizens rapists.
As previously noted, immigrants have a statistically lower rate of crimes than the latter group. And in one way or another, we are all immigrants. My maternal grandfather was a ninth generation in primogeniture descent of a certainly undocumented immigrant, the latter having arrived, as he did, in the 17th century.
No Native American asked for his passport. The naturalization paper of my paternal grandfather, framed, hangs on my wall. I believe they were both good persons.
Responsibility comes one by one. An individual does not represent a group. It was implied that the 20-year-old does. He doesn’t. And latent bias should not be encouraged to surface.
Mary Anne Whelan
Cooperstown
