When my kids were little, I would set them down and we’d watch ‘Cops’.
I would tell them that there are actually people in this world like these bad people on ‘Cops’. I would be careful not to stereotype different races and cultures, but I didn’t sugarcoat things either.
Little children need a balance between Veggie Tales, Disney movies and all that sweet innocent stuff and the harsh realities of an evil world. My kids are all grown now, and they have a healthy outlook on the goodness (and badness) of this world.
we didn't do Disney, Sesame Street, any of that stuff... we did classical lit... all the fairy tales were the "real" fairy tales... Blue Beard, Red Riding Hood where the grandma really does get eaten... we read about the Trojan War, and such things... so they were not sheltered in that way... i just wanted to keep them in the garden until they were able to reason as perhaps an intelligent 8-9 year old would... they were exposed to things little by little--age appropriately... of course, certain kinds of violence, we sheltered them from... the sex stuff, we sheltered them from... they are now 16 and 12--both well adjusted... smart... clever, witty... and people loving... they still do not feast on "disney channel, junky television, etc." they are well-informed, logical, verbal, and even funny... i'm glad i kept them in the garden until they were in about the 4th grade... that's when they started to leave... and entered their dialetic stage...