Malaysians embrace ‘babi’ banter as pig farming course goes viral

It all began when Universiti Putra Malaysia’s Sarawak campus, located in Malaysian Borneo, promoted a one-day course aimed at educating participants about pig rearing. The course advertisement, featuring a cute piglet, quickly ricocheted across Malaysian social media, drawing both laughter and pointed cultural commentary.

In Malay, babi is a loaded term, often used to disparage those deemed rude or arrogant. Its sting is sharpened by religious sensitivities: for Malaysia’s predominantly Malay-Muslim population, pigs are considered haram, or forbidden, under Islamic law.

Yet pork remains a staple for the country’s sizeable ethnic Chinese community and non-Muslim groups, making the animal somewhat divisive.

A social media post for the course, shared by the university last week, garnered more than 6,400 likes and over 400 comments, as users gleefully tagged their friends.

“Today I learned that I need to attend a course before I can start rearing you,” one user name Amairee quipped.

The presence of a Malay agricultural expert among the three course trainers in the advertisement did not go unnoticed by commenters, some of whom responded with equal measures of humour and irony.