MTV Arabia: A Month Later
December 9th, 2007Happened a month ago and I never heard of it. Found this, from Ta3beer. And further, this article from Time, of which, this paragraph made me laugh: “MTV Arabia has to find the right mix of old and new. On a recent afternoon, producers reviewed a commercial featuring a traditional Arabic music ensemble, with one musician on the lutelike oud. Little by little, the oud player went wild and trashed his instrument, Jimi Hendrix-style. The meeting erupted. “You don’t just break an oud,” said a producer. Another chimed in, “We don’t want it to be seen that MTV is coming from America and breaking your oud.”
An alternate ending is in the works.”
The new channel apparently wants less melodrama, and “plans to mix it up with Arab hip-hop, a genre that thrives in the Middle Eastern club scene but has been ignored by the music channels. A new MTV Arabia show, Hip HopNa, travels to four cities looking for the best local talent.”
So despite FOX hopes MTV Arabia will give a helping hand to the War on Terror, excluding the added possibly inflamatory potential of Rap as it might lead to fanning flames of Arab anger, saviour MTV is itself mixing the usual lamentation with new blood. If not DAM.
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“FOX hopes MTV Arabia will give a helping hand to the War on Terror”
MTV is terror. And it will not result in any good.
Isn’t MTV about 8 years late into the game? I figured MTV would have set up a channel catering to Arab audiences prior to 2000. Guess not.
They tried to do that with MTV Asia, which immediately turned into a mini-Hindi VH1.
Either way, I’m not looking forward to this. They always say that; “oh we will respect and give a voice to local artists!” and a few weeks later all you see is gangsta hip hop, and never the good political kind either.
A new channel is welcome to our Middle East, well as some have stated, too many music channels have been created and now we can see many of the aritsts we never knew they existed in the Midde East , through these channels.
MTV will sure find its audience, but as Esra’a mentioned, it will be wonderful fot eh popularity of the channel if it is blended with the local flavor and the local good artists are promoted, and why not?
Somehow I doubt that will happen. They’re interested in making profit, not promoting our cultures.
who gives a flying fig what FOX news thinks? You know why they call it FOX news? Because “whacked out evangelist cowboy news” is too hard for the anchors to say! MTV was once a great way for good bands to be creative and get exposure to a wider audience, but now it’s become just another packaged mass consumption exercise, designed to jack up the price of cheap hoodies and badly made pants. I’m really suprised that the runaway success of Utube hasn’t encouraged folks in the real street music scenes to launch their own, web-based channels. (Perhaps an idea for you idle youngsters)
i agree, its all about profit, and MTV couldn’t give a flying Frig (on a stick) about promoting Arab culture. look what they’ve done to promote African American and latin culture in the US! I can’t see anything positive coming out of this..
YES!!! HALF NAKED ARAB CHICKS!!!
Esra’a
What if promoting our cultures do contribute to the profit ? blink blink
Well Jina
but we Middle Eastern are we the Middle Easterns, that’s what we are 
aren’t we so very wonderful ? 
That was what I heard from a Palestinian scolar, who lived in America and after years and years of being away from the Middle East, he dicided to pay a visit to Jordan. He goes to this hotel and for few days he changed all these new stattelite channels on the tv in the hotel, se says man! they are either reciting the holy text or a group of half naked chiks swaying. The two extremes.
Well, I think our Middle East is trying to preserve its balance with the speedy rate of changes we are bombarded with. The first reactions are always extremism, but that is to define some lines and later, the new picture will be downloaded, pehaps better resolution, perhaps enhanced features
Really? Wow, I had no idea.
Although I like MTV Europe and UK over MTV in the U.S. simply due to my own musical interests haha
MTV used to be good when they had 120 Minutes and AMP; now it’s an utter joke.
MTV Europe is horrendous though, I mean when do they actually play the music? It’s always those sexual reality shows, like “date my mom.” God.
The thing with MTV is that they realized how much people have been complaining, so MTV USA is trying to win back some love by leading all of these political campaigns that aims to bring awareness to youth. They had $700,000 from the Knight Foundation last year, to fund a mobile project where kids keep each other updated on current events or whatever… I wonder what they consider current events.
“ATTN: HEATHER CHANGED HER HAIR TO PINK.”
“Important! Baggy dresses are OUT! Mini skirts are back in.”
“Who are you guys voting for this year? OMG I wish Nick Carter was running for Prez!”
I wonder why people even bother funding them. It’s not like they ever go anywhere with their silly initiatives.
MTV Europe has those shows now? Good lord!
MTV as an organization if adopts policies of McDonalds, could be more popular, you go to India and you see in all branches the sign of ” Beef is not Served in this Place”. Instead veggie dishes here and there. That is respecting the local culture and accomodating. Not that if not MTV will not have its own audience, it is just it will have more fans, will have a wider range of viewers and so on. The things like that person’s hair goes pnk and the other’s skirt shrinks, although very boring, but it is better than channels of showing guns and ta ta ta all the time.
I think that dating mom story is a remedy to the scaring fact of kids dating any one they felt like back in the west, which indeed would bring about haphazzard, I guess through this channel they are trying to ammuze their own teens and some how controling their own ways of dating, in a fun way, it is good for them, pehrhaps in MIddle East still we don’t need the program. At the same time, it is good when people from different cultures look into one another’s ways of living. I don’t find all the cultural diverse events all wrong.
ohh MTV, how you continue to dazzle us with such intellectually stimulating programs such as NEXT, Hogan Knows Best and the affectionately titled, YOUR MUMMA. Cannot wait to see what the producers come up with for an Arab alternative..
You know what? Call me a dork but I like how bashing MTV brings the world’s youth together. As one. Ommmmm.
Hi Elinor,
This is not really a positive form of cultural diversity. This is cultural hegemony, which is not positive at all. Witness what is happening in the USA with media conglomerates limiting freedom of speech and public participation by serving as mainstream gatekeepers. You get manipulative techniques like news plagola where such media outlets promote entertainment news for the sake of its own profit and self-interest. MTV is like that, they will do whatever it takes to increase their revenue. I mean, I’m not complaining, the more media to pick from the better, but I just don’t see MTV serving any positive cultural role in our societies. They base their success off of profits and ratings, not off of any “good” messages that they send off to our societies.
As for MTV using “fun” strategies to teach kids “good things,” this is not the case at all. Sit through these shows for one hour and tell me that your brain cells are at all empowered. If anything you will feel yourself getting dumber, with the kind of language that is being used as well as the kind of activities they promote (sex is okay; dating is great especially if your mom does it too; it’s okay for your mom to find your boyfriends completely sexy; it’s okay for you to drink and to be shirtless around strangers all the time, it’s okay for you to laugh at virgins, it’s okay for you to have sex at 15/16.) And look at all of the women in these shows – hardly any of them qualify as “fat.” It’s just the furthest thing from “average” but it is promoting such images as being the ‘norm’ so that kids do their best to fit in. Trash TV at its best, and with a horrible, useless message.
What possible reason do we have to believe in their ethics or values or what they are really trying to encourage? This is not and will never be about cultural diversity. This is about money; exploitation. It has nothing to do with promoting Arab culture or “serving” Arab youth, as if we have anything but apathy and stupidity to gain from such embarrassingly silly programs.
bla bla bla…. w000t to HALF NAKED ARAB CHICKS!!!
There won’t be half naked Arab chicks. Only gangsta ones from New York posing as Arabs.
now lets not be to hasty, Gansta chicks need love too..
I can be gangsta if I really want to.
See, me and my boo’s we got grands to use. With terrible attitudes sucka, who needs you? Huh, you got your dirtyass feet on my couch. And smokin weed in my house. Is you sick, yo?
(Hey) This how we do (whoa) I’m the baddest far from the average (hey) I’m a diamond princess (whoa) ghetto F-a-b (hey). Watch yo back MTV, you better not be caught messin’ with me.
lol, thats so hot. your spitting diamond bars Esra’a.. nuff respect rudegal
So, if you were the programming director of MTV Arabia, what shows would you put on? Live broadcasts of Ray’s comedy tour would be good. Maybe an interview with the Muslim Miss Teen Australia? The Palestinian group Anger Boys and Afghan hip-hop artists, Esra’a doing gansta rappin’ (I’d tune in to see that!).
If you were in charge, what would you do?
MyTwoCents, I would create a Real World Beirut haha
Esra’a
So a tv with all what you say is just reflecting back what is already there in society, but it ceases to deny people who are affected by it. It is perfect when we have a society where people respect one another, virgins are honored, instead of being rediculed, or mom and daughter wouldn’t have sex with the same guy. With all the nations being so much mixed in culture and ethnicity and ethics, now we are not black and white any more. WHat you say is culturally ideal,but what about recognizing people who are rude as well ? trying to understand and socialize with them? we cannot avoid them forever, we cannot fight with them forever as well, we can mix as much as we preserve our defining values, at the same time Esra’a, believe me, it is more challenging, but safer to live in a socitey with all what you are saying, because we won’t trust the TV with our kids, we will act selectively and intervene more with what kids might pick up at what age. I have talked to some ladies in America( as we play scrabble on yahoo), I frankly ask them what they do with their kids, at what age they expose the kids to what should be ecposed many say they don’t let kids watch TV programs, they said TV is full of violance and that is not good for the kids. One said it all depends on how much parents earn, the more they earn, the more they can spend quality time with their kids and control their input, but if we have a single mom trying to feed a bunch of kids, which is to much the case, then kids cannot be as much monitored as required.
no woried 
I do understand what you mean, and sort of , feel the same in many ways, I don’t like my kids to act rude, I don’t leave them to MTV to be trained ethically,but I do defend the concept of free society where every one have a tribune to speak out for themselves. Well I believe what is exactly differnt in the shape of our societies and theirs is that their wrong aspects come to surface and ours sinks down so that no one would see them eye to eye. We cannot deny we have the same sort of problems in our society and there are differnt ways of treating them, or treating the youth who tend to be rude ( they are many, let’s call them MTV generation
Then I go back to the back of the same Dollars and read: In G-d We Trut. I do as much as I can and i leave the rest to my Lord
MTV Arabia will be more in tune with eastern culture, much more than MTV Europe, that I am sure about and I will wait till I watch it and then we can see what it really will offer
Insightful comment, Elinor! I just have to ask, it says next to your name “Iran,” do you just live there, or are you actually Iranian?
Esra’a dear, I am so close to you now, you can get into a boat and come over and stay over
I have this little flat in Kish Island, it is Iranian, it was meant to be a free zone, but here there is some misconception about freedom, but the Island is beautiful. I live here with my two daughters and my husband, and we are students, I have fallen in love with the Island and I want to stay here , as there is not much population, just 24,000 people, I guess there are only 1500 cars in the Island. I know Bahrain is very close is you are stationed there. So if you come, you have a member of your forum here not far way
Elisheva, i like the feeling of all people of the world coming together as well, but you know what? My ideal youth music tv is an MTV Middle East, with all Turk, Kurd, Arab, Persian, Israeli, Afgan, Hindi , Enlish artisans singing and rocking and swaying, the next MTV , could that be the MTV of Middle East ?
Elinor, so are you an American currently living in Iran?
Esra’a can I email you ? and where ?
Yes please:
director@mideastyouth.com
Esra’a I am not an American. Well if you consider me a resident of a unified world, then I can be considered American too, as well as Bahraini
and you ?
I’m not American, I don’t even get visas to that place! I am Bahraini and very proud of that
Though I have Iranian, Afghan, and Kurdish roots! But I do consider myself 100% Bahraini despite all of those historical attachments.
By the way, you guys can see a lot of MTV Arabia videos here.
It looks revolting already.
Except for the Dabkeh Dude promo. This one’s cool.
Esra’a
This is very nice. This reminds me of when a couple of trading firms from Iran and Bahrain were discussing a contract and I was there, intervening, well as an interpretor. The Persian guy told the Bahraini, Oh you guys were Iranians some 50 years back or so,and the Bahraini said, ” We are so happy and pleased with our independence. If we were still affiliated with Iran, Bahrain would be less develpoed than your Baluchistan.”
Bahrain is this beautiful Island in the gulf, with modrate people, and a flourishing economy. There had been too many inter-marriages, that is what I like about it, with all your roots you are a proud Bahraini
It was painfully true. If you look at Baluchistan you see the potentials of a beautiful place striving for development, wonderful people living there, fresh water supply and the soil that woulkd give you back for example tomats , just 20 days after being planted.
Now look at Baluchistan and see how neglected it is,there should be some one from within the nation, from within the people of that place to feel for the place and work hard in order to provide for the country effectively.
I know in Bahrain there are many Persian people still living and enjoying the peace and the rate of development.
Viva Bahrain
[...] I discuss MTV Arabia Author: Esra’a (Bahrain) – December 20, 2007 Not long ago, Tasnim from Libya wrote a post about MTV Arabia here and it triggered the interest for this podcast. I talk to Mohammed (DJ Momo), [...]
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