The FCC

Federal Commission Committee

445 12^th Street, SW

Washington, DC 20554

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing you concerning the rating systems and content information of various media forms. I am a college student attending Brigham Young University.  I am currently taking a class discussing the different effects of media on family.  As we go through the history of media, I am impressed by the good content that is now available such as appropriate children’s TV shows and movies.  I am also surprised by the content “now okay” for PG and PG-13 movies.  For example, the number of times the F-word can be used in a PG-13 movie has changed from 2 to 3 to 4. Often what is allowed in the movies is constantly changing as the years go on.  Sometimes as a consumer it is hard to stay informed and up to date on the rating systems. 

There are two areas that would greatly benefit users if they were improved.  The first is a universal rating system, and second content labels for books.  Although, I do not necessarily believe that you should restrict certain media, there should be a more consistent rating system across media forms.  Songs, books, TV shows, movies, and video games all have different rating systems.  Movies go from G to NC-17, even though TV ratings are similar there are many differences.  The TV rating system has TV-Y, TV-Y, TV-MA.  Video game ratings seem to run on a completely different track.  Music only has the one rating.  Consumers are not even sure what constitutes the rating “Parental Advisory: Explicit Lyrics.” If there was universal rating system confusion would be greatly reduced. 

Books are a type of media that have no rating system or content warnings. Parents and other readers would greatly appreciate a content label for sex scenes, high levels of violence, profanity, and drug/alcohol use.  Many people would benefit from content labels on books.  These could be a simple box on the back warning for sex scenes, graphic violence, profanity, and etc.  These simple warnings would help readers know what they are about to read and whether the content is something they want. It would also be beneficial for parents who are trying to promote good literature to their children and teenagers.  I understand that it would be costly and time consuming to go over every book, but it would be worth it. It also doesn’t have to be all at once, but we do need to start somewhere, so why not now?