Bill seeks kid-friendly plane area

raleigh, n.c. – Prompted by parents’ complaints about sex and violence in in-flight movies, two congressmen introduced legislation Tuesday calling for airlines to create kid-friendly zones on planes.

“The airlines have chosen to put our children in a situation that I don’t feel comfortable with,” Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) said.

He and Republican Rep. Walter Jones, also from North Carolina, call their proposal the Family Friendly Flights Act.

“This legislation will be one avenue to help parents take back their right to determine the appropriateness of the content to which their children are exposed,” Jones said.

The bill calls for the creation of sections on commercial flights where there would not be any publicly viewable movie screens. It would still allow airlines to show the movies they choose on big screens in other sections, or on individual seatback screens.

“How do you tell a 4-, 5-, 6-, 7-, 8-year-old, ‘Don’t look at the screen,’ when it’s basically all over the cabin?” Shuler said.

David Castelveter, spokesman for the Air Transport Assn., a trade group, said it was up to the airlines to determine which movies to show.