Keep Your Home Entertainment Clean

INTRODUCTION
Pornography. Violence. Crude humor. In our ever-changing world, these influences are gaining a larger foothold into our homes. How? Through our entertainment. TV, movies, video games, computers, you name it, if it is produced by someone outside your house, there is the possibility that it may contain some form of offensive content.

If you are like most people, you like to be entertained. You watch or record your favorite shows, rent DVDs, and perhaps even play video games. If you were to take drastic measures to prevent offensive material from entering your home, you could throw your TV out the window. While this act may temporarily stop what you watch, soon you will have another set that you will watch more frequently to make up for lost time.

For less drastic measures, here are some ways to become informed about the entertainment that enters your home, what what steps you can take to control the content you watch.

TELEVISION
Rating system: Television ratings range from TV-Y (All Children) to TV-MA (Mature Audiences Only). While I don't need to explain each rating (you can find that information here: http://www.tvguidelines.org/ratings.asp), most television stations display the rating for 15 seconds at the beginning of the program.
Parental controls: Televisions manufactured after 2000 are required to have a feature which allows you to password-protect programming based on the show's rating. This technology is called the V-Chip. The V-Chip reads a show's rating and can block specific shows. For example, a parent can block TV-14 and TV-MA programs from playing on their TV.
Another way to effectively block offensive television programming is to stick with the basic television lineup. This may be a drastic change for some, but sticking with the basic channel lineup (channels 2-13 in most cases) greatly reduces the chances that offensive content will make it onto your television screen. These stations rarely show TV-MA content, and most movies shown on these television stations are edited to give them a TV-PG rating. If you live in an area where television stations are broadcast over the air, you can get your basic channel lineup for free, in both high definition and standard definition (until February 2009, see http://www.dtv.gov/consumercorner.html#whatisdate).

DVDs
Rating system: Nearly all movies that have been in theaters are rated by Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). These ratings range from G (All Audiences) to R (Restricted). These ratings also transfer when the movie is released on DVD. See http://www.mpaa.org/FlmRat_Ratings.asp for more information on movie ratings.
Parental controls: Few stand-alone DVD players provide parental controls. Check your player's manual to see if your player provides parental controls. The XBOX 360 and PlayStation 3 video game systems, as described below, both play DVDs and provide parental controls to limit the DVDs that will play on these systems.

VIDEO GAMES
Rating system: Ratings for both computer and video games are designated by the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB). These ratings range from eC (Early Childhood) to Ao (Adults Only). See http://www.esrb.org/ratings/ratings_guide.jsp for more information.
Parental controls: Allow the owner of the system to prevent adult-rated games from playing on that system. The following systems provide parental controls: Microsoft Windows Vista (see http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/features/details/parentalcontrols.mspx), Microsoft XBOX 360 (called Family Settings, see http://www.xbox.com/en-US/support/familysettings/console/xbox360/consolefamilysettings.htm), Nintendo Wii (see http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/systems/wii/en_na/settingsParentalControls.jsp) and the Sony Playstation 3 (see http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/security.html#1106). Setting up parental controls gives you peace of mind, knowing if you kids bring home a game that is rated above your chosen rating, the game will not play in your home.

HOME COMPUTER
Rating system: Because of the open nature of the Internet, there is no rating system for web browsing, email, or chat rooms. Although there is not a defined rating system, there are things you can do to prevent offensive content from entering your home. See the next section on parental controls for more info.
Parental controls: Microsoft Windows Vista has parental controls built in to restrict games, time limits, and view activity reports. If your home computer is Windows XP, you will need to set it up yourself. See my blog post on child-proofing your PC for more info (http://kevinstechreviews.com/2005_02_19_archive.html). Blocking unwanted banner ads is also key to removing offensive images that appear when you or your kids are browsing the web. To block banner ads, visit http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm.

CONCLUSION
With the ratings systems and built-in parental controls, you can keep offensive content out of your home, and stop your kids from viewing that content when they are alone. Most of the parental controls are only available in newer systems (i.e. the V-Chip is only available in newer televisions and parental controls are only available in newer operating systems like Microsoft Vista), so you may be required to upgrade to a newer system if you want to have greater control over the entertainment that comes into your home.