Translating ISIL’s ‘atrocity porn’
By the Islamic State’s ( ISIL) customary gonzo standards, a recent video depicting the execution of five men accused of spying for the British government was relatively tame, and the gore quotient minimal. No one’s head was cut off and ceremoniously placed on their contorted and ravaged torso. Nobody was subjected to the horror of being set on fire in a cage; or drowned in a cage; or being run over by a tank; or being tied to the back of a speeding car; or having their heads literally ripped off. For ISIL, the video was, indeed, positively muted.
Yet it remains profoundly disquieting, especially for the Western English- speaking audience at which it was primarily aimed. This, in part, is to do with the British accent of the executioner- in-chief in the video, and what it signals: apostasy, defection. It says, “I grew up where you grew up, I learned to speak how you speak, and I lived where you lived — and yet I reject you and everything you stand for.”
What the man — believed to be Abu Rumaysah — with the British accent in fact said was: “Oh British Government, oh people of Britain — know that … we will continue to wage jihad, break borders and one day invade your land where we will rule by the Sharia … ” He also warned, “you will lose this war, as you lost in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
This is, of course, a concrete threat, aimed at the British government, its citizens, its armed forces and their collaborators. But the greater threat comes from that British accent, because it raises the spectre of the “enemy within,” and undermines confidence in the presumed superiority of Western values: If this person has defected, then who else has? And who else might? At the same time, the British accent transmits and supports ISIL’s narrative of the global “caliphate,” with a truly transnational appeal and make-up.
But the chief reason for the disquiet raised by the video isn’t the British-accented killer; it’s the British accented kid. He appears at the very end of the video, after the victims have been shot. He is very young — reportedly four years old — and is dressed in military- style fatigues. He warns, in English: “We are going to go kill the kafir ( nonbelievers) over there.” Reports suggest that he may be the son of Khadijah Dare, a British woman who left for Syria several years ago, although, for ISIL and its various audiences, his identity is less important than his meaning.
This isn’t the first time ISIL has used a child in its atrocity porn. In January last year it released a video of an angelic-looking Kazakh boy, no more than 10 years old, shooting to death two men, also accused of spying. And in June, it released a video of a mass-execution carried out by a group of teens in Palmyra’s Roman Theatre. But this is the first time a child has featured in an ISIL video issuing a threat in English against the British government and people.
What is the child doing and what does he symbolize? He is first and foremost reading a script, and, like the many other children ISIL has hijacked or captured, he doesn’t know what he is doing. He is a victim, an instrument of ISIL’s brutal and ruthless will. He is also, more crucially for ISIL, a prestige symbol, enlisted to communicate strength and endurance, both to ISIL’s rank and file and to their enemies. Given its recent military setbacks and losses, this message has special urgency for ISIL: We are still here, the group is saying, and we will prevail, whatever you throw at us.
The militarized ISIL child is the perfect vehicle for expressing this point, since he is a graphic symbol of, or testament to, the strength and tenacity of the ISIL worldview, and how it has found root and replication in the very young. He also symbolizes continuity, reassuring existing ISIL fighters that once they have perished in battle their fight will live on through the blood and sacrifice of their young.
This is disquieting enough, but the real disquiet comes from the boundary- transgression the use of the child in this video signifies. Children, the world over, represent innocence and purity and life in all its great potential. Casting a child in a snuff movie is a massive affront to these ideals and the very meaning of childhood. In this sense, it arouses the same disquiet as that provoked by the eroticization of children and pedophilia.
It’s hard to know what species of feelings ISIL most wanted to elicit in its British audience: feelings of revulsion and disgust or feelings of fear and terror. The former would suggest a punitive intent with no additional motive, whereas the latter would point to a more instrumental logic, whereby the aim would be to undermine support for military strikes against ISIL, and spread fear among ISIL’s own internal enemies who would help facilitate these attacks. It is, of course, eminently possible that ISIL wants to foment both.
What is also unclear is just how effective shock and horror, to say nothing of terror, are as a mode of political communication. Shocking or horrifying images may well capture the headlines, but it’s an open question whether they work as tools of intimidation. In the longrun, they may just provoke feelings of anger and the desire for revenge.
THE GREATER THREAT COMES FROM THE EXECUTIONER’S BRITISH ACCENT. IT RAISES THE SPECTRE OF THE ‘ENEMY WITHIN,’ AND UNDERMINES CONFIDENCE IN THE PRESUMED SUPERIORITY OF THE WEST.