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Taking Action
Community-based projects
- Organize a parent media awareness group at your school. You can gauge the level of interest (and clarify your priorities and goals) by sending a copy of the Your Family and Media survey home to parents with your school newsletter.
- Start a parent movie-reviewing project. See Screen Teams (see right sidebar) for an example of a successful school-based reviewing project.
- Encourage your local video store to become more "family-friendly." Ask them to:
- post a sign stating that it will not rent or sell restricted movies to minors.
- expand its family and classics section. Take in a list of suggestions.
- display information about the Canadian Home Video Rating System used on the videos.
- purchase a movie review book and make it available to browsing parents.
- move video covers displaying graphic scenes of violence or sexual activity where they can't be viewed by young children.
- display your Screen Teams reviews on the counter.
- Contact your municipality about starting a media violence awareness initiative. The City of London, Ontario, has been holding such an event for several years now. Its Family Film Fest encourages families to spend an evening together, enjoying a non-violent video.
- If your community doesn't have a children's film festival, start one. (See the Promoting the Best in Movies section for a list of Canadian film festivals for kids.)
Voice your opinions
- To comment on or complain about the content of a movie, you should contact:
- The film production company and distributor
- Complaints about the rating of a theatrically released movie should be directed to:
- Comments on the rating of a home video should be directed to:
- Concerns about movie advertising on Canadian TV or radio should be directed to:
- If you want to protest against the practice of marketing merchandise to children that's based on movies rated for teens or adults, you can:
- Contact the manufacturers
- Boycott stores that sell the products
- Avoid fast-food outlets that include such merchandise with kids' meal
- If a movie trailer containing adult content is shown at a movie aimed at a younger audience, complain to:
- If you object to sitting through a string of commercials in a theatre before the feature film starts, you can lodge a complaint with:
- If you have concerns about movies being shown at your child's school:
- Tell the school administration and your parent council (parents should have a say on the number and type of movies used in the classroom)
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