How to turn it around: I don't think you can, so let's just do the right thing: Get rid of it. There's no reason for having the MPAA as a ratings board, and if the major studios want to lobby Washington , they can do that through well-greased mechanisms of the multi-national conglomerates that own them. If parents want to know if their children should see a movie, they can see it themselves. Or read about it themselves. Or check in with privately-run websites like Common Sense Media. Or go with their kids. Or wait until it comes to DVD and watch it with their kids then. Or some other form of responsibility and self-awareness. The secret and subjective MPAA forces filmmakers through hoops in the name of protecting a 'values'-driven vision of American society that dates back to before the '60s, and a theater-driven vision of the entertainment business that dates back before the VCR. Considering all of the MPAA's evils -- toxic nostalgia for a long-lost (or never-was) era, hypocrisy and phony morality -- the only thing I can think of that's worse than all of the above is playing along with the people behind them them.