"Let There Be Wicked Kings and Beheadings"

I write. I write as a hobby because stories fly through my mind and some of them I have to capture and make come alive. I write to remember there is bravery, and courage, and hope in the face of darkness.

And I read to my daughter and watch with her tales of courage and bravery and hope.

In our current culture, we have this notion that children should be protected from all evil, but we don't just seek to protect their person. We seek to protect their minds. We sanitize the world, afraid to let our children know how awful it really can be. And in so doing, we leave them woefully unprepared for a world where life is anything but easy.

Whenever I think about childhood, I often think of the past. Children growing up in past times were rarely sheltered from the world as it is. They knew it was hard. They dealt with sickness and death and wickedness.

But today we have this misguided notion that children should be kept "innocent" for as long as possible, that the harshness of the world should be hidden from them until they are "ready" for it.

Ready for it? It's already here. They live in the world. My husband and I have made a conscious decision not to hide the world from our children. We don't hide the news, we don't pretend evil doesn't exist, we don't explain away sin. We face it head on.

One of my favorite C. S. Lewis passages tackles the issue of entertainment frightening children. He says this: "Those who say that children must not be frightened may mean two things. They may mean (1) that we must not do anything likely to give the child those haunting, disabling, pathological fears against which ordinary courage is helpless: in fact, phobias. His mind must, if possible, be kept clear of things he can’t bear to think of. Or they may mean (2) that we must try to keep out of his mind the knowledge that he is born into a world of death, violence, wounds, adventure, heroism and cowardice, good and evil. If they mean the first I agree with them: but not if they mean the second. The second would indeed be to give children a false impression and feed them on escapism in the bad sense. There is something ludicrous in the idea of so educating a generation which is born to the Ogpu [State Police in the USSR] and the atomic bomb. Since it is so likely that they will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage. Otherwise you are making their destiny not brighter but darker. Nor do most of us find that violence and bloodshed, in a story, produce any haunting dread in the minds of children. As far as that goes, I side impenitently with the human race against the modern reformer. Let there be wicked kings and beheadings, battles and dungeons, giants and dragons, and let villains be soundly killed at the end of the book. Nothing will persuade me that this causes an ordinary child any kind or degree of fear beyond what it wants, and needs, to feel. For, of course, it wants to be a little frightened."

Some have questioned our choice in entertainment for our children, mainly in the area of violence. Let me be clear. We don't show our daughter movies with buckets of blood spraying all over the screen. We don't pick movies chock full of language. And for the moment, sex is definitely out as that takes more explaining and understanding than she currently has. But we do choose to watch movies with evil beyond that of a kiddie nature.

Evil is real. Sin is real. This world is not easy. Our daughters will face pain and heartache and death and wounds. And I want them to face that world with courage and heroism and good.

By sanitizing the world, we leave our children to be shocked when evil descends. We give them no categories for dealing with the evil of the world. I want my children to know there is evil and I want them to be prepared for it. I want them to cling to stories of "brave knights and heroic courage." I want them to know that they can stand in the face of darkness.

So, yes, we watch movies with evil. And yes, we read books with evil characters. And yes, I write stories with evil and violence. But we also watch movies where good triumphs. We read books where people stand firm in the face of the dark. And I write stories where people overcome.

Let's not pretend away our world. Let's not sanitize what isn't sanitized. If we want to make our children strong to survive, let's show them the truth--the world contains evil, but evil can be overcome with good.