“Civilizing” the “Barbaric” Child: The Case of the Khadrs

Abstract

In this article I explore the Khadr family through shifting Canadian news media representations and the CBC’s documentaries, “Al Qaeda’s Family” and “Out of the Shadows.” Omar Khadr and his parents, Maha Elsamnah and Ahmed Khadr, came to be framed as a “bad” Muslim family as a result of supposed failed (Muslim) parenting. I interrogate how media attach Omar Khadr’s acts of violence to orientalist images of the violent (terrorist) Muslim family, and framed Elsamnah and Ahmed Khadr as foreign and un-Canadian parents, unable and unwilling to socialize their children within the Canadian state order. When Omar Khadr was released from prison, it was only under the guidance of his white lawyer, Dennis Edney, that he could be rehabilitated and brought back into Canadian society in Canadian news media framings. In order for Khadr to be portrayed as worthy of reentering Canada, images of him practicing his religion, wearing non-Western clothing, and even speaking Arabic were subdued. It is within the images of Khadr in the Edney home, severing his relationship with his family, that the Canadian public could be reassured that Khadr would be able to reinvent himself as a Canadian citizen, a child soldier, rather than a Muslim terrorist.