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Originally Posted by Danny Fekete
Griffonwing, you seem to find your morality closer in step with that advocated by the ethical boards you invoke, and as a result, stand to benefit from that infrastructure, leveraging it to do your book selection (and moral engineering) for you and your children.
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No, I would not trust the current ethical boards, the same that I do not trust the public school system with the 'truth' they teach.
I am not advocating a rating of any kind. When I mentioned the movies, I was referring to the subtopics of the rating itself (This film includes blah blah blah).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Elfwreck
"Drug use" varies widely by culture. Do you mean that any book in which a family sits down to dinner with wine every night, should get a warning for drug use?
I take it you don't read many Harlequins.
I started reading them at the age of 9. The ones I read--Harlequin Romance, Harlequin Presents--were pretty much tame romances: boy meets girl; girl hates boy; boy & girl are forced into prolonged contact with each other; boy & girl fall in love & live happily ever after yay.
The ones I read today--Harlequin Blaze, Spice, Silhouettes--I would not hand off to my 13-year-old daughter, who has no interest in such subjects. Some romance novels are stories of emotion and love; some are tales of eroticism, and those could be labeled as such. (I'd certainly rather know before reading; I'm long past any interest in 300 pages of banter leading up to a single kiss.)
I have read 2 Harlequinns. They must have been mixed in with some of my books when My mother handed me a box from my youth. After reading everything else, those were the only ones left. They were pretty racy, even as a 25 year old at the time. So in the hands of a 13-year old? No way.
As for younger adult Harlequinns, of those I am unfamiliar with.
Hm. Before, you mentioned sex & drugs. Now it's gratuitous sex and drugs? Who decides if sex is gratuitous? (I suspect your judgment would not agree with mine, on that.) Or if drug use is necessary for the plot? (And that's before we decide which drugs are acceptable in the story... anything legal in the setting of the story? Anything legal today?)
The problem with content ratings isn't that they're a bad idea, it's that there really isn't any agreement on what "should" get a rating. We can probably all agree that books with seventy-page explicitly-detailed sex scenes should indicate that to the reader. We have more dissension on books that aren't obviously catering to a particular "kink" in the readers... how about pop supermarket books like the Flowers In The Attic series, which had incest, child abuse and murder? How about Stephen King novels that have horrific themes? How about action thrillers with lots of explosions and bodies that fall like rain?
The issue isn't with rating books... it's with who gets to assign the ratings. It comes down to "what total stranger gets to decide what warnings--or prohibitions--to inflict on my children?"
I steer my kids at books I think are good for them; I discourage (but don't forbid) them from books I don't think are useful for them. I might like help with figuring out which books I'd like to suggest for them--but I don't trust most people who want to "protect the children;" I find they generally have values that don't match mine.
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Again, i never stipulated any sort of ratings from any ratings board. I do apologize if it came across that way. I was only interested in a small box on the back of the book. One the back of the book, where you read a small blurb of what the book is about, at the bottom, perhaps there is a box stating whether or not sex, drug use, or language is included.
As for drug use, I mean LSD, pot, cocaine, heroin, etc. not cigarettes, pipes, beer or wine or any alcohol. I know those are still drugs, but it should have been apparent.
By gratuitious sex, I mean very prolific in the book. Not just a one or two time occurrence.
I'd like to know if there is sex, and if so, is it prolific, does it encompass the story? What about the drug use? Cocaine, Heroin? If any of these feature heavy in the book, then frankly, it should not be directed at children.
As for other books, such as Grapes of Wrath, for example, which was mentioned earlier. Yes, this is read in many english lit classes, however, the book itself is not geared as a novel for young adults. They can read it, sure, but it's not marketed towards the YA sect.
No, I do not condone the ratings (this book is rated G or YA, or what have you).