New TV Ratings Please Politicians, Not Industry

The television industry formally agreed to an enhanced ratings system Thursday, but its agreement to abide by the wishes of Congress and other critics by labeling programs that contain sex, violence and coarse language has all the qualities of a shotgun wedding.

While Vice President Al Gore and other politicians were joined by family advocates at a White House press conference to trumpet the agreement, TV executives were noticeably absent, choosing to make their own announcement via a press release.

“This is not a day of celebration for us,” said one network executive. “We’re bowing to the inevitable in terms of political pressure.”

Even the White House, which had called for the ratings system to be given a 10-month trial when it was implemented in January, had abandoned that stance. Gore recently joined the political chorus calling for more content-specific guidelines.

“This is a major step forward to give parents the tools they need” to protect their children from objectionable programming, Gore declared Thursday.

The plan got generally poor reviews in Hollywood, however, with NBC opting not to sign on at all and the guilds that represent writers, directors and actors expressing their concern about a chilling effect on programming.

Scheduled to take effect Oct. 1, the new system uses the letters S, V, L and D to denote potentially objectionable levels of sex, violence, language and dialogue. A fifth designation, FV, will be affixed to children’s shows with high levels of “fantasy violence.” Those labels will be incorporated into the existing TV rating system, which indicates suitable viewer ages.

The agreement provides family advocates with a more thorough ratings system and politicians with a political victory. The industry, in turn, hopes it provides them with at least a temporary reprieve from what has been a constant stream of criticism and threats of legislation since late last year.

“What we gain is a cease-fire from legislative pain for a reasonable amount of time,” Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Assn. of America, said in an interview.

Valenti cited promises by several key senators and congressmen that they will not back legislation involving TV ratings and content for several years now that this agreement has been reached.

Industry executives negotiated the new system with the National PTA, the National Education Assn., the American Medical Assn. and seven other organizations in response to a congressional threat to enact a ratings system into law if the industry did not act voluntarily.

Arguing that the legislative threat had politicized the issue, some Hollywood writers, producers and directors said they fear the new ratings will stifle artistic creativity.

“There’s no such thing as a good ‘V,’ John Wells, the executive producer of NBC’s top-rated “ER,” said in an interview. “How are they going to differentiate, for example, between a show that examines the consequences of violence and a show that’s just exploitative?”

Wells and others in Hollywood said they are afraid the ratings will stigmatize adventurous programs among advertisers and possibly keep some shows from ever getting on the air.

“Established shows like ours will be fine,” Wells said, referring to “ER.” “It’s the shows in development that I worry about. “A show that can be labeled can be boycotted, and that could affect the networks’ choices.”

Those reservations are shared by the Writers Guild of America, the Directors Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild, which issued a joint statement saying they cannot support the agreement and fear it will have a detrimental impact “on television programming enjoyed by millions.”

“If a show has a TV-14-V-L-S-D icon, that’s got to have some effect,” said Brad Radnitz, president of the Writers Guild of America West.

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The guilds have threatened to file a lawsuit challenging the agreement but said they are reserving their options while they evaluate the revised system.

Network executives acknowledged they may have underestimated the depth of parental concern about violence and sex when they created the age-based system, under which two-thirds of prime-time programming has simply been rated TV-PG.

“You can’t just ignore it when your customers are saying they’re concerned about what their kids are seeing on TV,” one executive conceded.

At the same time, they objected to negotiating with parents groups under threat of more restrictive legislation from Congress.

In their public responses, broadcast officials did not hide their dissatisfaction with the process, even as they endorsed the agreement it produced.

“At times, this debate has come perilously close to government involvement in program content,” CBS said in a statement.

ABC President Robert Iger said in an interview that his network supports the new system but objects to the government intrusion that provoked it.

“We decided to do this because we think that adding more information is the right thing to do, and the existing system can be improved,” Iger said. “We had to separate that decision from the way this became politicized. We would oppose any effort by the government to regulate TV content.”

Network executives said they had not yet determined how the new ratings would be applied to specific programs and it would be premature to discuss them.

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But Iger was willing to speculate. He said, for example, “there might be occasions” when an episode of ABC’s adult-oriented “NYPD Blue” would get multiple symbols denoting sex, violence language and dialogue. These would come on top of the current age-based rating of TV-14, which indicates “NYPD Blue” is not suitable for children under the age of 14.

ABC’s sitcom “Ellen,” Iger said, might get a D because of suggestive dialogue in some episodes.

All the broadcast networks’ soap operas generally have been rated TV-14. But it is unclear whether they are likely to receive a TV-14-S or TV-14-D rating--or both--under the new system. Sources said that the D category, which the networks wanted, is designed to separate actual displays of sexuality from innuendo-laced shows like CBS’ “The Nanny.”

In a concession to critics, children’s cartoon shows will have a special label--FV for fantasy violence--that will be added to the existing categories of TV-7 and TV-Y7.

Representatives of the 10 children’s, medical and educational groups that negotiated the deal praised the industry for agreeing to revise its ratings system. But they noted that they view the new plan as a compromise on their part, because they would have preferred a system that indicated actual levels of sex, violence and language.

While promising to honor an 18-month moratorium on seeking ratings-related legislation, the groups said they want to subject the new system at some point to independent review.

“We intend to give this new system a chance to work in the marketplace,” said Kathryn Montgomery, president of the Center for Media Education. “But we see it as a compromise . . . and we want to see it tested.”

Valenti, chief architect of the existing, age-based ratings system, said he still believes the current guidelines would work, and the new one may be too complicated and cumbersome to help parents.

But, like other executives, he acknowledged the practical reasons for endorsing the expanded system.

“We need this Congress and this administration on issues like piracy,” Valenti said, referring to the movie industry’s desire for tough controls on video piracy abroad.

For the broadcast networks, whose business is regulated by Congress and the Federal Communications Commission, concerns about station licenses and additional digital channel space were a factor in the political calculation.

“Every time one of our lobbyists went to the Hill on another issue, congressmen would ask them when they were going to do something about TV ratings,” one network executive said.

Some critics maintain that the ratings, in whatever form, do nothing to address more fundamental issues about increased permissiveness in television content.

“We’re very concerned that it doesn’t go far enough,” said Mark Honig, executive director of the Parents Television Council, which has pushed for a reinstatement of the “family hour,” which would limit the first hour of prime time to family-oriented fare.

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“We really feel that no matter what you do with the ratings . . . it doesn’t address that issue of cleaning up programming. Parents are still going to be crying out for better content in prime-time television.”

In a similar vein, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Sen. Ernest F. Hollings (D-S.C.) criticized the new system Thursday and threatened to seek passage of additional legislation they are sponsoring.

“This agreement guarantees nothing to parents who want and need to stop this epidemic of violence from entering their homes,” Hollings said.

But Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, suggested those bills would go nowhere because the leadership of both the House and Senate have endorsed the moratorium.

Hall reported from Washington and Lowry from Los Angeles. Times staff writer Heather Knight contributed to this story.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

New Ratings System

The enhanced ratings adopted by most of the television industry calls for current codes to be accompanied by these additional guidelines.

GUIDELINES

V Violence

S Sexual situations

L Coarse language

D Suggestive dialogue

FV Fantasy violence