"This 'social experiment' is a disturbing, intellectually baseless replay of tired African colonial stereotypes with the added insult of cheap celebrity. Appalling," one viewer, Tom Shaw, wrote on Twitter.
"Struggling to believe that Channel 4's British Tribe Next Door was ever greenlit. There are so many better ways to teach and learn about other cultures …" another viewer, Rebecca Elton, wrote.
The Guardian's television critic Lucy Mangan asked: "Why did no one put a stop to this?"
"How has this implicitly racist idea made it to our screens in 2019?"
Before the show aired, Moffatt urged critics not to judge the show before they'd seen it.
"Let's make judgments not from a book cover yeah. I know majority of people (bar the people who are negative about everything) are going to love The British Tribe Next Door," she tweeted.
She also brushed off accusations of white privilege, saying her "friends were happy, empowering and beautiful souls inside and out" and the family left a borehole for the tribe when they left Namibia, which someone now maintains.
Others said the show was "moving" television that made them reflect on the wastefulness of their lives.
WOMEN BOND OVER HOUSEWORK, CLOTHES
The first episode of the series centred predominantly on Scarlett and her mother Betty befriending the women of the Himba tribe.
Betty bonded with a group mothers by showing them how she ironed clothes, put dishes in the dishwasher and dirty clothes in the washing machine.
The Himba women, who tend to perform more labour-intensive work than the men do, baulked at how much water she used and laughed at how she could relax while the machines did all the work.
Meanwhile, Scarlett showed a few women around the terrace house, including inside her bedroom upstairs.
After holding each other's hands up the staircase, the Himba women asked Scarlett why she had brought so many possessions and also questioned her about her body.
Later, they invited Scarlett to strip off and wear their own traditional dress, but Scarlett ultimately declined.
"I would never wear something so little in public, ever," she said.
