Shame on the Society of Professional Journalism’s semantic gymnastics propaganda crusade versus the term “illegal immigrants” as offensive.

According to SPJ’s The Quill magazine, something called the “Diversity Committee” thinks The Associated Press style book should change to provide amnesty to undocumented immigrants until they are proven to be in the United States illegally.

The last thing we need in securing our borders is more politically-correct liberal thought police.

SPJ’s Diversity Committee met during the 2010 convention in Las Vegas and decided to engage in a yearlong educational campaign designed to inform and sensitize journalists as to the best language to use when writing and reporting on undocumented immigrants.

Fox News host Megyn Kelly, an attorney, wondered Wednesday afternoon if journalists would start calling rapists “non-consensual sex partners” next.

Burglars could be “unauthorized visitors.”

Pew Hispanic Center in 2005 settled on “unauthorized migrant” because so many people entered the country with counterfeit documents, “undocumented” seemed inaccurate.

The knock on illegal alien in the article written by a longtime member of the SPJ Diversity Committee, is that it originated with “fiery, anti-immigrant groups” along the U.S.-Mexico border, such as the Minutemen, and is offensive to Latinos, “especially Mexicans.”

“This is a classic effort in propaganda. The people who control language often control the agenda, and if you go back and you look through history movements that have looked to control the terms of a debate, they often start with trying to control the language that’s used,” pointed out Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR).

“There’s nothing pejorative about using the term ‘illegal alien.’ An alien, according to the law, is the legal definition of somebody who is not a citizen of the United States. Somebody who is not a citizen of the United States and is here in violation of the law, that legal term is ‘illegal alien.’ ”

Maybe a New Year’s resolution should be to reread “1984” by George Orwell and refresh our memories about thought police.