A segment broadcast on Moroccan state media has caused controversy by giving makeup tips on how to cover bruises. The 2M channel has been forced to apologize after its “Sabahiyat” program provoked outrage by presenting advice on how to hide domestic abuse with cosmetics.
A petition to the country’s media regulatory authority has called for an apology from the channel and the harshest penalties to be implemented against it. The Change.org petition, which has gained over 1700 signatures so far, denounces what it suggests is “the message of normalization [of] violence against women”.
One Moroccan signatory wrote that “I have signed because I have had enough of violence against women”. Another said “Makeup is not a means to cover up the mistreatment of women”. The campaign also gained support from individuals across the world, including in Belgium, Canada and France.
Moroccans expressed anger on social media at the program’s matter-of-fact treatment of domestic violence, using the hashtag “hitting Maha”:
بائع الماكياج للزبونة : هذا ينفع للجلد، هذا ينفع للعيون، هذا ينفع لراجلك باش ما يشوفوكش الناس مزرقة ويمشي للحبس.#ضرب_مها
— عزالدين أمجاهد (@amjahed_azzad) November 27, 2016
Make-up vendor to the customer: This is beneficial to the skin, this is beneficial to the eyes, this is beneficial to your husband, so that people don't see you are bruised and put him in prison.
Do not cover domestic violence with makeup, condemn the aggressor! #ضرب_مها -- #Morocco https://t.co/bRrpqdxmjg
— بثينة العزابي (@Boutaina) November 25, 2016
The miscalculated piece, shown last Wednesday, was presented in recognition of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, marked on November 25 each year. Two-thirds of Moroccan women experience domestic violence and only three per cent report it to the authorities, according to the Moroccan High Commission for Planning.
The channel apologized on Friday for the content, and removed it from its website, highlighting its “commitment for 27 years to the defense of women’s rights” and promising to take steps to ensure greater regulation around the topic in future.
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