WATCH: Ellen Urges Viewers to Petition for Changing Rating

Ellen DeGeneres spoke on her show Tuesday about the potential of the documentary Bully to change lives and urged viewers to sign a petition launched by a lesbian teenager who is trying to get the film's rating changed to PG-13.

Katy Butler, a Michigan high school student who identifies as lesbian, launched a Change.org petition to overturn the antibullying documentary Bully’s R rating, and she personally delivered 200,000 signatures Tuesday to the Motion Picture Association of America.

The documentary, directed by Lee Hirsch, will be released March 30 and has been the subject of a controversy surrounding the MPAA's refusal to give the film a PG-13 rating, which would allow it to reach a wider audience and be shown in U.S. schools.

Butler told The Advocate in an exclusive statement that "we sent a loud and clear message to the MPAA that
the movie Bully shouldn't be given an R rating."  She hopes that showing the movie in classrooms means it would reach "those
students who need to see it the most" and help improve students' lives. "Every day in every middle
school and high school in America, students are bullied," she said. "This movie, if
given a PG-13 rating, could reach those students as well as bullies
themselves and help put a stop to the epidemic of school bullying in our
country."

Watch Ellen discuss the film below.