Smut patrol.

I hate stories like this.

In one, a man injects heroin frequently and cheats on his wife repeatedly. In another, a man seriously considers killing somebody, and then does. In the third, a mentally ill man locks himself in a room where he collects his own urine in jars.

If you’re going to see any of these Academy Award-nominated films, why not bring along your favorite 13-year-old? The Motion Picture Association of America says it’s OK.

Oh, poo. The story is about “ratings creep,” a legitimate topic — how what was once an R-rated movie is now a PG-13, and so on. I only wish such stories would focus on the dreck that’s in theaters with PG-13 ratings, not the tiny handful of decent movies with semi-objectionable material that are actually worth seeing, by teens and adults.

Stories like this, in other words:

These days, you could say that there are essentially three kinds of PG-13 movies: movies that are teenaged through and through, but often in the worst and most puerile sense, technically eschewing adult fare like nudity while substituting scenes that are in fact smuttier and more disturbing (for example, a scene in which a young woman — shown from the rear — lifts her top to flash an onlooker). In addition, there are children’s movies that essentially reach for PG-13: movies that probably could have been rated PG, but which have been juiced up with enough gratuitous sexuality and violence to earn them the higher rating. And finally, there are fundamentally adult movies, like “S.W.A.T.,” whose true nature is R but which are increasingly able to make a few deft excisions and extract a PG-13 from the board charged with rating films. As a result of this last technique, says Stephen Prince, a communications studies professor at Virginia Tech, in terms of content the PG-13 and R ratings have become virtually interchangeable.

I hope this isn’t the dawn of a new, CAP-alert era — the Freep story helpfully tells us that “Ray” includes “26 damns and 19 hells.” All I want to know is if it sucks or not.

But as long as we’re on the subject…

I may have mentioned our Family TV Hour, which evolved over the last few months, the Wheel of Fortune/Jeopardy block from 7-8 p.m., during which the three of us unwind, play word games and jeer at the contestants who scream “Big money! Big money!” too loudly. And let me add this: Thank God the February rating period is over, because that hour was a favorite for multiple promos for the upcoming evening news, which, during rating periods, is heavy on the big three — sex, sleaze and fear. We’ve been told about tsunami orphans sold into sex slavery, the secret your teen is keeping from you that may ENDANGER HER LIFE (anorexia bracelets), and the like.

The other day Kate said, “Sometimes the news scares me.”

“Me, too,” I said. “But mostly it just pisses me off.” (OK, I really said, “irritates me.”)

The last two weeks I’ve been letting her stay up until 9 to watch “Survivor” with me. After 8, the fun really starts, promo-wise. If you know that “CSI” follows “Survivor,” you know what I’m talking about.

“Is that show rated R?” she asked, after I covered her eyes to avoid a split-second shot of a sex swing (IN THE PROMO).

“No,” I said. “It’s rated S. For stupid.”

Enough, then.

I’ve been saying this for years: “It�s so interesting that one of the chief critics of smut in television, Brent Bozell, who runs a right-wing media watch group [Media Research Center], is silent when it comes to the public standards of Rupert Murdoch�s sleaze empire. They do have a double standard. They are silent about the fact that it�s capitalism, and that it�s the media tycoons who are polluting the public sphere.”

Now that Bill Moyers is saying it, maybe some people will listen. But I doubt it.

Posted at 10:32 am in Uncategorized |
 

4 responses to “Smut patrol.”

  1. Danny said on February 25, 2005 at 11:02 am

    Interestingly enough, the riske nature of the Fox fare was commented upon by none other than Homer Simpson. I’ve seen maybe a handful of Simpsons’ episodes over the years. A few years ago, one of them has a scene where Homer is watching what is apparently an “adult” movie judging from the sounds coming from his TV. He comments that Fox has made the inevitable slide into a full softcore porn channel. Out of the mouths of cartoon characters.

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  2. harry near indy said on February 25, 2005 at 4:44 pm

    lewis black mentioned last night on the daily show’s back in black segment that fox produces the sex-drenched stuff that the yahoos on fox news denounce.

    not for nothing if murdoch a shrewd businessman. then again, he got his start in the tabloid side of newspapers. if he could get away with it, he’d print pics of topless young women in the ny post.

    that’s why most, if not all, conservatives who work for fox news and the weekly standard are hypocrites, and i have no use for them.

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  3. harry near indy said on February 25, 2005 at 4:52 pm

    ps.

    somewhat off topic, but nancy, you’ll be glad to know the latest regarding indiana’s possible switch to daylight savings time.

    the indiana house of reps delayed a vote on it thursday, feb. 24, because two members with absent, according to the indy star.

    they were out of town because of deaths in their families, the star said.

    yeh, right. and i bet the dog ate their homework.

    and the star didn’t mention the names of the two representatives.

    btw, if you call me a hoosier, i consider it just as insulting asif you called a black man a n.

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  4. Trent from Manchester College said on February 27, 2005 at 1:21 pm

    What is wrong with parents being the rating system? When I was growing up I was told what I could and couldn’t watch. This isn’t that long ago, I’m not quite 22 yet. Parents have, by and large gotten lazy. I can make this call, I see what my friends parents do for them. This is much deeper than some ratings system and what needs to be done to “protect our children.” They don’t ask about movies, they don’t ask about friends, they hand their kids a cell phone, a car, a trust fund and say go live your life. The media is blamed by the parents because they would never let thier child watch anything like that, while dad is having an affair and mom is quitely on her third bottle of vodka this week. Blame the media though. The real world is worse than we can make any fiction. Don’t call the censors, they are overworked as it is. I mean, one breast did ruin the innoncence of a nation. Let parents be responsible for which films and shows are appropriate for their children, make them be involved, becuase by and large, it is they who are slipping.

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