You have YouTube's content rating system backwards.
It's not "racey content gets marked special" with "suitable for children" being a catch-all category.
YouTube's "content developed for children", is the special case. It's explicitly content meant for and marketed to children, or content that children would be particularly attracted to, like nature documentaries.
All other content should be marked "not intended for children", even if it's not "adult"--aka restricted to 18+--content.
This is stated pretty clearly in YouTube's documentation. They have a link to it in a contextual pop-up right next to the form field asking you to self-rate the video.
> We wanted to let you know that our team has reviewed your content and we don't think it's in line with our Community Guidelines. As a result, we've age-restricted the following content:
> Video: Komoot Bug
> We haven't applied a strike to your channel, and your content is still live for some users on YouTube. Keep reading for more details on what this means and steps you can take if you'd like to appeal this decision.
> What "age-restricted" means
> We age-restrict content when we don't think it's suitable for younger audiences. This means it will not be visible to users who are logged out, are under 18 years of age, or have Restricted Mode enabled. It also won't be eligible for ads. Learn more about age restrictions.
When I click on appeal I get a popup titled "Submit an appeal" with the body text of "Appealing this violation is not available"
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EDIT: Ah. I see. I actually did set it to "Is made for kids" thinking that this means that through this option I express that it does have no content which would be against the community guidelines.
I've now changed it to "Not made for kids" but also "Not age restricted".
>or content that children would be particularly attracted to, like nature documentaries.
maybe times have changed, but you could not pay me to sit through a nature documentary back when I was 8.
nature content is a very weird gray area of content in terms of age ratings. It's technically just, well, nature. But then there can definitely be "just nature" content you don't want a kid to see.
It's not "racey content gets marked special" with "suitable for children" being a catch-all category.
YouTube's "content developed for children", is the special case. It's explicitly content meant for and marketed to children, or content that children would be particularly attracted to, like nature documentaries.
All other content should be marked "not intended for children", even if it's not "adult"--aka restricted to 18+--content.
This is stated pretty clearly in YouTube's documentation. They have a link to it in a contextual pop-up right next to the form field asking you to self-rate the video.