A refined system with the V-chip is a future possibility

At a spirited press conference Thursday, Jack Valenti, the head of a group of TV and cable executives, championed the industries’ final proposal for a TV ratings system to help parents decide which shows their children should watch.

Modeled after the motion picture ratings system that Valenti devised in 1968 to prevent states from taking advantage of a Supreme Court ruling permitting them to essentially censor movies based on local standards, Valenti’s proposal would rate shows on the basis of age levels of child viewers. Programs rated “TV-14,” for example, “may contain sophisticated themes, sexual content, strong language and more intense violence.”

When drafts of the system were leaked to the press last week, they encountered strong criticism. What’s needed, critics said, is not censorship but a system that gives specific information about the levels of sex, violence and language in programs. While the new system is better than what exists now--largely nothing--it still falls short of meeting the legitimate concerns of many parents.

The industry for many years has resisted calls for television ratings systems in part because of worry that ratings would limit a show’s appeal to advertisers. But in recent years, political pressure has mounted for more accountability for what viewers, particularly children, see on television. Even President Clinton, who is heavily supported by the entertainment industry, called on media and entertainment leaders to come to the White House to work on “concrete ways to improve what our children see on television.”

The broadcast industry heard the call of the inevitable and has been working on a ratings system most of this year. For several reasons, Valenti’s age-based system is unlikely to help parents as much as a ratings system based on specific content. It also poses other problems, such as the conflict of interest inherent when producers are allowed to rate their own shows.

The committee formed to oversee the ratings system--composed of Valenti (as chairman), 12 representatives from the cable and broadcast industries and six representatives of the “creative communities”--is not representative of American opinion.

With the release of the final guidelines, the ball is in the FCC’s court. By Feb. 8, the agency is required by law to make some key decisions. The most important decision the FCC has to make under the Telecommunications Act is to dictate the design of the so-called V-chip, which will be part of every new television set by 1998 and will enable viewers to program their TVs to block out certain programs. If the FCC adopts the industry plan as a national standard and bases the V-chip on it, content-based ratings will be precluded. The manufacturers who plan to use V-chip technology are waiting for a clear signal from Washington before they tool up their assembly lines.

Parents would be better served by a delay now and a more flexible system later. The FCC does not have the legal authority to dictate how broadcasters should rate their programs, nor should it.

The FCC does, however, have leverage over the broadcasters because it is in the process of deciding whether to grant them jurisdiction over a newly released portion of the broadcast spectrum, potentially worth billions of dollars.

The new TV ratings, although indeed a start, are not as useful a guide to parents as they could be. But in the highly political and moneyed mix of Hollywood and Washington, it is perhaps naive to presume that parental needs would be the foremost consideration.