It’s Ramadan, so it must be time for another ‘Tash Ma Tash’ controversy! Arab News reports…
This time around, the target is polygamy. The writers turn it around to a matter of polyandry, though, and that’s got some people hot under the collar. Rather than seeing it as a social critique, the humor-impaired see it as an attack on religion. It’s hardly that… Islam, after all, doesn’t require that a man have four wives. It only permits it. The choice to have multiple wives is a personal and somewhat-social matter. But it certainly has an effect on the supernumerary wives. And that is exactly the point this popular TV show was making.
Tash Ma Tash again stirs controversy
FATIMA SIDIYAJEDDAH: A controversial episode from a satirical Saudi television show was finally aired on Saturday, despite coming under fire from scholars and viewers.
The “Multiple Husbands” episode, the fourth to be shown on the 17th series of Tash Ma Tash, revolves around a woman with four husbands who wants to divorce one so she can marry for the fifth time.
It is based on Saudi columnist Nadine Al-Bidair’s article “My Four Husbands and I,” published last December in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Masri Al-Youm. The column created a major Islamic debate and received massive criticism.
In the episode, the woman marries her second husband because the first stops caring about his looks after five years of marriage as well as being too busy with work.
The woman marries the third husband as part of a dare with her friends. She then weds the fourth because he is Syrian and by that point she is bored with Saudi men.
She tells her husbands that she wants a fifth because she wants to feel young again, but adds that she needs to divorce one of them first in order to achieve this.
After the men draw lots, she divorces the husband who draws the short straw.
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August:16:2010 - 12:54
It sounds like a brilliant way to show men how marrying four women (often for absurd reasons) really looks.
August:16:2010 - 13:28
Downloaded it and watched it yesterday (No MBC on Times-Warner Cable!), it was quite funny. There was a heavy handed commentary bit stuck to the end, which tried to explain the point of view of the sketch and the message it was trying to get across. I just knew as I watched it that some people would still not get it. Just like how people reacted to the news article that this sketch is loosely based on.
August:16:2010 - 15:07
The right to polygyny seems like something Muslim men do not want to give up, whether they ever intend to use it or not.
Saudi Jawa-can you email me a link so I can download? I looked on the MBC Arabic site but I couldn’t find that episode–though I do have a much better sense of what constitutes Ramadan viewing fare!
Thanks 
August:17:2010 - 13:02
Chiara:
I’m not sure what John’s policy on download links are, so I’ve sent you an email.
August:17:2010 - 13:52
Saudi Jawa–Thanks! I assumed you would send it by email, and I just got it. Now where my brain was when I left the comment here instead of must emailing you is an impenetrable mystery!
August:17:2010 - 16:50
sounds funny! Can someone post a link here?
August:17:2010 - 16:55
Download links to sites that conform to the general site rules are welcome! That means non-porn, non-spamming, non-extremist.
August:17:2010 - 17:57
Well, depending on how you define non-extremist, it is a major role reversal, softened by humour, and a film within the film technique.
This is the link for a free download:
http://rs814.rapidshare.com/files/412968623/6ash4.rm
I would assume there are copyright issues on the video? Or it was posted by MBC for general use after the airing?
August:17:2010 - 18:30
Chiara:
Not that I know of. I do know that MBC don’t exercise their copyright as strictly as, say, Rotana. You can find their progamming on YouTube on occasion.
August:17:2010 - 20:10
Saudi Jawa–thanks! I included the link in my upcoming post, but if I can find a legal way to embed I will!
August:18:2010 - 05:56
It’s up, and this post of John’s is linked:
If It’s Ramadan, It Must Be Tash ma Tash Season: Social Satire or Carnivalesque?
All are welcome to read and comment.
August:19:2010 - 05:39
I missed the episode because I had to work but my girls thought it was the BOMB.