There was a Tik Tok trending on the worldwide spider web this week. When I saw it, I had to question if it was real or a real good troll. A nanny in charge of two kids was trying to keep track of where the kids were. She couldn’t get ahold of the girl, so she had to call the boy on his Ipad and have him call the girl. She complained about the inconvenience of it, and proceeded to rant about how inconvenient it was. She then suggested that a phone company invent a centralized, permanent phone located in the home, that had a cord. For when the Wi-Fi was down, or the 5G wasn’t working. She said it would just be one phone number that everyone knew to call.

Yeah, that would be really cool if something called a land line existed. If only Alexander Graham Bell would have thought of something like that. And maybe all the kids that listen to Spotify wonder if they could own a physical copy of the music they listen to. Us really smart Gen X and Boomers should come up with such a technology.

I bet they would love something too, when they lost access to their friends’ Netflix, Hulu, Disney Plus, Apple TV, and YouTube and the internet was down, a centrally located place where they could watch a movie with their friends. We could call it something like…mmm….a movie theater. We could install really great huge screens, the best sounds, and comfy seats. We could just charge them an arm and leg for popcorn and soda. It would be a really convenient way to get away from their parents, and a way to hold hands with a girl, without their parents being around.

The only problem with a movie theater is that there is someone there not allowing them to see certain kinds of movies, because of the ratings. I remember a time when there were only 3 ratings for movies. There was G for general audiences, PG, for Parental Guidance, and the R Rating, which was for the forbidden movies. Only having 3 ratings was a pretty bad idea, because I remember a few movies that were PG, that had some nudity, and should have been rated R.

In fact, one of the movies I referenced above, 16 Candles, was rated PG, and was the source of one of the most embarrassing moments for me and my wife. We were only married 4 months and she was visiting my house for Christmas. She was feeling nostalgic for the movie, so she bought it and were watching it my living room on our little portable DVD. Just as the shower scene came on, which we both forgot was in the movie, my dad walks in and declares, “What are you guys watching!” As you know, never watch a movie with your parents. It’s even more embarrassing when you’re 27, married and it should have been fine because it was PG.

Eventually, some movie makers like Steven Spielberg wanted a new rating between the PG and the R, so PG-13 was invented. For a long time, TV didn’t have ratings, but in the early 90’s, TV started pushing more mature content, so in 1996, TV started its own rating systems, and music and video games followed soon after.

So now TV has Y, G, PG, TV-14, and Mature. Then they have all the letters that tell you what kind of material there is. If a TV show has DLSV, you know you definitely want to watch it and your kids aren’t allowed.

As great as it is for us to have ratings systems for the content of our media, I think it would be much more helpful to have a ratings system for the content of people. Media is something that we voluntarily watch and at our own peril. But people are a requirement. We have to be around them, whether we like it or not. Should we not at least be allowed to see what is so horrible about them, so we can avoid the people that we don’t want to be around?

As much as I like watching violence in action movies, or playing it in video games, in real life, I would not be slapped with a V rating, because I don’t even like wrestling with my son (mostly because he can pick me up right now and I don’t like low level flying). I would probably have a LB rating, which would stand for Language Bitterness, because I use language that is offensive to people that aren’t bitter. If someone else had the LB rating, I would instantly know that that person and I would at least have something to complain about together.

We could slap a P rating on the political people, so we could know to avoid them at all costs. We could just have a designated corner for them to argue at, while I sit starting at the wall in the other corner.

We could have the IN rating, which are people infected with Influencer culture and only want to talk about their miniscule followings on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube. We could slap a warning label because they use offensive language like tag me on social @bensbitterblog, and “Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and comment on all my posts!”

There would be the video game ratings of V-X, V-P, V-N and V-PC. They could further segment into which platforms they use, like X-Box, Playstation, PC or Nintendo. This would make it easy for dating, so guys or girls that aren’t into the games can avoid anyone with the V label, and anyone that has the V label would be safe to bring up video games on a date.

A required rating for me, would be the sense of humor rating, which would break up your sense of humor into types. Of course, there would be the M for mature rating, the DS for dry sense of humor, the DMJ for dad or mom joke person, the PP for pun person, the SR for sarcasm, and even the NO for no sense of humor. This rating would allow me to avoid anyone with the NO rating, and head right toward the PP/DMJ/DS/SR humor rating.

Of course, there would be many other ratings we would need as humans, but the most important one for me would be the overall mature rating. I would, of course, be rated I, for immature, which would make it much easier for people that have realistic goals and the desire to be a grown up to avoid me at all costs.

Before every meeting with a person, we need everyone’s content and rating letters. Not only would it be a way for most people to get a better feel for what kind of evening they will have with a person, but it would give me an excuse to avoid everyone, because everyone is above my ratings tolerance.

So, I present the following Bitter Friday Giftures, which is rated IMPVXUNINTONP. See online rating for what this all means…

Was watching the Tik Tok…

And this new one…

The girl on the Tik Tok was wondering…

And I was like…

And Spotify users probably thought it would be nice…

And they probably wish there was a place…

In the days pre-HD…

Then TV started needing…

If ratings are vital for media…

Then people, who you are required to interact with…

Especially one for…

I would be rated I…

Yeah, I’m sure you would all hate the rating system for content…at first. And yeah, it would take you a while to learn what all the letters meant. But admit it, you would start liking it, because it would make it a lot easier to figure out what people were like, and how horrible they were. And it would save you a whole lot of time knowing that you wouldn’t like to be around anyone.