Does our rating system work?

[Sara]

G, PG, NC-17....

Does this rating system do what it's supposed to? For that matter, what do you believe it's supposed to do?

I realize that maturity level varies greatly among people of the same age, and I'm sure many of you know twelve year olds more mature than adults you know. I also know people who don't care about ratings at all and let their kids--young kids, mind--watch whatever they want. That may be nothing more than an example of bad parenting, but I'd like to see what the rest of you think.

[wrist cutter]

I think the ratings are fine. Some people aren't going to pay attention to them, some are. I don't really see the difference it makes.

[PrettygurlRei]

I think its okay, but my parents or myself dont pay attention to them much, so I believe whats the use of having them...

[Flash]

Some places in New Zealand ignore ratings totally... Me and NeoC used to hire GTA3 frequently, and that's an R18... And no, I don't agree with the ratings.

[Chaos]

Ratings are stupid. Completely and utterly stupid. I mean, they have puppets in G movies saying "Hell" and "damn", so what's the point of setting restrictions, when the founding company of the system disobeys them? This falls under the whole "censorship" thing for me. Thus I oppose it.

[RicoTranzrig]

[COLOR=darkblue]A lot of movies games aren't reviewed well enough (maybe they watch the first 10 minutes before deciding). I suppose it is a warning for parent's of younger children...[/COLOR]

[BabyGirl]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by SuperSayian [/i]
[B]Ratings are stupid. Completely and utterly stupid. [/B][/QUOTE]

[color=deeppink]I think that the concept is good, it's just the sytem that screws it up...kinda like Communism, heh.

When (and if) I have kids, I'll kind of want to know what sort of movie they're going to, or at least know if there's content that may concern me as a parent. In that case, I'd want ratings to be implimented (and obeyed by film/rating companies).

The only thing I disagree with is the fact that you have to be 17 to see an R-rated movie. First of all, 17 is a weird age to set the restriction at, and secondly, most kids start watching R-rated movies so much earlier o_o. I think it should just be up to the discretion of the parent on whether their kid can see one or not...NOT some silly age-restriction set by laws :P[/color]

[PiroMunkie]

[color=indigo]I don't neccesarily disagree with them, I just think they begin to flaw as time passes. Since kids begin to mature more and more earlier these days, I think that if they would continue to have these ratings, to boot them down a bit. Personally, I just think they shouldn't be there at all. I mean, I can understand with movies, but I don't think TV, music, and video games should really matter. For a quick example, for those who watch Adult Swim on Toonami, before each show they have that message saying the following feature is intended for mature audiences overv the age of 18. The first question popping into my head is "what about the mature audiences [i]under[/i] the age of 18?"

So these rating laws or whatever are a bit outdated, and shoulr really either be changed or jsut rid of, and as some have said, just left up to the parents.[/color]

[Corey]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by SuperSayian [/i]
[B]I mean, they have puppets in G movies saying "Hell" and "damn", so what's the point of setting restrictions, when the founding company of the system disobeys them?[/B][/QUOTE]

This is what poped into my head when I read the first post.
The children and teens or, young adults, are becoming more desencitized to violence and language plus other debated things. For this reason the ratings are becoming less and less of value. 'G' now leaves the movie open to small swear words and violence. 'PG' has realistic violence, harsher swear words, and sometimes realistic weapons. 'PG-13' is filled with very real violence, all the swear words, violence with guns and other weapons, sensuality and sexuality, and sometimes nudity. 'R', nowadays, is almost as good a rating as 'NC-17'. It has full-out sex, blood and gore, horrible acts of violence, and sometimes even rape. There is almost no use for the 'NC-17' rating.
There should be a new rating system developed. That's all I have to say.

[Fall]

Most video shops around won't care if you hire out a video that's not suitable for you. Me and my friend went into one a few days ago (a popular one, actually. the store was called "Blackbuster"), and we hired out this horror movie that was rated R18+. And not a question was asked.....

they should start cracking down on stuff like this.

[Rain]

[COLOR=darkblue]Squashed Snail, how old are you? It's just that some kids do look older than their age. like my brother. When he was 16 he would have been able to rent a R movie because he looked way older than his age.[/COLOR]

[SaiyanPrincessX]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by DarkOrderKnight [/i]
[B]

This is what poped into my head when I read the first post.
The children and teens or, young adults, are becoming more desencitized to violence and language plus other debated things. For this reason the ratings are becoming less and less of value. 'G' now leaves the movie open to small swear words and violence. 'PG' has realistic violence, harsher swear words, and sometimes realistic weapons. 'PG-13' is filled with very real violence, all the swear words, violence with guns and other weapons, sensuality and sexuality, and sometimes nudity. 'R', nowadays, is almost as good a rating as 'NC-17'. It has full-out sex, blood and gore, horrible acts of violence, and sometimes even rape. There is almost no use for the 'NC-17' rating.
There should be a new rating system developed. That's all I have to say. [/B][/QUOTE]
Thats not nessisarily true. There arn't many G movies anymore, most are now PG and up. I mean I do see a few G(new I mean). PG-13 can have little swear words, such as The Mummy Returns:D , it only has 4 through out the movie. I think I'm getting a bit off topic here though.

I don't really disiagree with the ratings system. For movies, tv, video games, ect. Its the parents choice whether or not to let them watch or play things intinded for older audiences.

[Defcon5]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by PiroMunkie [/i]
[B][color=indigo]I don't neccesarily disagree with them, I just think they begin to flaw as time passes. Since kids begin to mature more and more earlier these days, I think that if they would continue to have these ratings, to boot them down a bit. Personally, I just think they shouldn't be there at all. I mean, I can understand with movies, but I don't think TV, music, and video games should really matter. For a quick example, for those who watch Adult Swim on Toonami, before each show they have that message saying the following feature is intended for mature audiences overv the age of 18. The first question popping into my head is "what about the mature audiences [i]under[/i] the age of 18?"[/color] [/B][/QUOTE]

That and those programs arn't even that bad. If they where a movie they'd be PG-13.

[Transtic Nerve]

The rating system is VERY biased aganst certain elements. I'm just gonna throw out a real quick example. There was a movie that was released last year called "L.I.E." It was a B-film released by an independent film company who's name I can't remember. Anyway, it was rated NC-17 on the specific basis that it delt with the idea of a pedophile. It never showed anything obscene or the likes, Just the implied idea. Which was the whole basis of the movie. A boy, who struggles with life and his own sexuality after his mother dies, befriends another boy. This other boy ends up being basically a gay hook-up. He has sex with everyone and anyone. Which is also not shown, just implied through the dialogue. And then the other boy who's mother died ends up befriending this pedophile and so on and so on.

The argument was that this should have never been givin an NC-17 rating. There was a famous movie, who's name I have forgotten, that delt with a pedophile to. But it was a girl, not a boy in this case, and that movie was rated R. L.I.E. (which stands for Long Island Expressway) was probably one of the most dramatic films I've ever seen. It was praised for it's great acting but shot down due to it's subject matter. And due to this rating, some people were prevented from seeing it

I don't agree witht he way the rating system is done. A secret select group rates these films. No one knows anything about them, their names, who they are, what they look like. They are completely unknown. But oh well. What are we gonna do.

[Shampoo]

[color=indigo][size=1]I read somewhere in the paper recently that the ratings aren't really doing any good because people don't pay attention to them. I try to pay attention to them and eveything, but that's just me. I know that there are some messed up people out there who take pleasure in corrupting their children at a young age.

I also read that Disney movies coming out are no longer rating G, but PG. I can't remember what exactly it said, but I don't understand why movies without sex, drugs, and foul language can't be popular. They can have a MUCH better plot without all that and violence and all that good stuff.[/color][/size]

[Sephiroth]

Rating systems don't work, no matter how hard they try, those that are under-aged will always somehow watch/purchase the film/game....

[Mitch]

[color=red]A movie is like a piece of artwork. And thus, I do not think it should be given a rating. If a little kid goes to a movie with their parents with lots of swearing, it's the parents fault. Also I don't see why video games have to have a rating system, pretty much all the good games out there are Mature...guess I'll just have to wait until I'm 17![/color]

[vegeta rocker]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Transtic Nerve [/i]
[B]The rating system is VERY biased aganst certain elements. I'm just gonna throw out a real quick example. There was a movie that was released last year called "L.I.E." It was a B-film released by an independent film company who's name I can't remember. Anyway, it was rated NC-17 on the specific basis that it delt with the idea of a pedophile. It never showed anything obscene or the likes, Just the implied idea. Which was the whole basis of the movie. A boy, who struggles with life and his own sexuality after his mother dies, befriends another boy. This other boy ends up being basically a gay hook-up. He has sex with everyone and anyone. Which is also not shown, just implied through the dialogue. And then the other boy who's mother died ends up befriending this pedophile and so on and so on.

that just sounds stupid. The rating was actually based on a idea and there was no actual scenes? Very dumb.

but on the fact of ratings, they aren't perfect. I still think its odd that when i was younger i couldnt see an R movie yet i could rent a M rated game.

[OlgaTheDwarf]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by vegeta rocker [/i]

that just sounds stupid. The rating was actually based on a idea and there was no actual scenes? Very dumb.
[/QUOTE]

It's actually not that stupid, it's called thematic content. In that case it would be considered mature thematic content, and a lot of kids/teens are not mentally prepared for stuff that.

Now about the rating system. All it is is a suggestion ( like pants:) ). It's the facilities that sell the stuff, that put age requirements on them. The ratings also help parents know if a movie is right for their child. I know that the ratings can be messed up sometimes, but now under almost every movies rating you can find why it was rated that. That is a bit more helpful then the G, pg, pg-13, r, and nc-17, ratings.

[Devidramon]

I think that parents should use their heads instead of letting the MCAA do their job for them (which is what "You can't watch anything PG-13 or above" is doing.) There are some PG-13 movies that made me think I was too young to be in the room, and some R movies which I wouldn't mind a five-year-old seeing. There are certain kiss-of-death elements that can change the rating no matter the content of anything else.

Nudity's an automatic R, which sounds okay at first, but let's look a little closer.

[i]Stargate SG-1: Children of the Gods[/i] has a scene of nudity. Apophis is looking for a body for his queen, Amonet. Daniel's wife Sha'uri is one of the candidates. He takes off the robe-thing she's wearing, walks around her looking over her, examines her hair, teeth, etc, saying something like "You may be the vessel for my future queen." He decides he likes what he sees, so Amonet takes her over. Next time we see her, she's got glowing eyes and a weird voice. We see everything, but absolutely nothing happened that could be seen as sexual by any stretch of the imagination. As innocent as an alien symbiote implantation gets. :smirk: And yet, for that scene alone, the movie is rated R. The TV version that's known to SG-1 fans as the series premiere, with that scene omitted, is rated PG.

However, [i]Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon[/i] has a sex scene. We don't see any nudity, because he's wearing... something... and his body covers hers. However, the way they're going at it was pretty intense, and she's somewhere around fifteen years old to his nineteen or twenty, and the whole thing is made to look romantic, him being the dashing rogue type and her being the high-class girl... it doesn't get more storybook than that. However, it's rated PG-13.

So, the one with nudity but nothing remotely sexual gets a rating of R while the one with sex with someone much older than the girl maturity-wise and someone she's known for all of a few days being made to look romantic gets a PG-13. If I had a kid, and I thought he or she was impressionable enough to pick up such "messages" from a movie, CTHD is the one "sending out a message," whereas COTG sends none. The more innocent movie gets the worse rating because they're not thinking content, they're counting square inches of skin shown. Clearly, the rating system is fallible, and, while an average R movie isn't something you wouldn't take a bunch of six-year-olds to see and an average G movie isn't something a bunch of 16-year-olds would be interested in, that kind of simple overview is all the system should be used for.

[Manic Webb]

The TV rating system is completely biased. Many network censored think "it's this kind of show, so it couldn't be [i]that[/i] bad!" I remember Adult Swim had a Yu Yu Hakusho marathon a couple weeks back. With Cartoon Network's constant disclaimers (which take away the entire point of the rating system) and the casual swearing going on in that series, you'd think the show would be rated TVPG, right? Wrong. Watch an episode one Saturday night, It's rated TVY7.

Meanwhile, Buffy The Vampire Slayer is rated TV14 for violence. Yes, because we all know that there is no such thing as a violent anime ;)

If I had kids, I'd decide if they can watch a movie based on what the movie is about, not the rating. If my kid is 13 and wants to see a rated R movie, it all depends. Violence and language in movies is fine as long as you teach your kids right from wrong at a very early age. I've been watching R-rated movies since I was 6 and I'm idealistically non-violent and to this day I still have a hard time saying the F-word and S-word.