It was meant to be funny. But Murr TV's (Lebanese MTV) "Ktir Salbe" comedy show's take on migrant domestic worker turned out to be racist, denigrating and dehumanizing towards these persons.

The show featured a 5 minute act where a couple was "negotiating" with a representative of a recruitment agency for a migrant domestic worker. The couple became aggressive and sexually explicit to the point where the recruitment agency representative responded to the couple: "Do you think that I am a pimp? I run a workers recruitment agency here!". The "couple" then asks for a dirty maid, peeing unwillingly and smelling, and hitting children. The "husband" at the end of the video suggested to the recruiter "to shove up his *** the broomstick that their last maid had used before she jumped from the balcony". At that point, when we understood that the couple are upset because of the suicide of their maid, the couple's sudden unwarranted slurs and foul language are covered by a long sequences of "beeping"!

This is not MTV's first time racist shows. MTV's odious, unethical and immoral show comes at a time when Lebanese and international media keep reporting on the trafficking and slavery of migrant domestic workers in Lebanon.

You can read here Ethiopian Suicides' take with some social media comments reproduced in the post.

And you can read here Anti Racism Movement's commentary.

As for the video itself, you can view it on this link. Do read the comments under it. [UPDATE February 9, 2012: the original video and the original comments were removed and the link was changed to another source].