When I was about 9 or 10, 1989 or 90 or so, HBO sometimes played documentaries on Saturday or Sunday afternoons. They were completely inappropriate for kids (and disturbing enough for some adults). Seeing them at such a young age instilled me with anxiety and mistrust of adults that took a long time to work through.

One of the docs was about the 'Satanic Ritual Abuse' which was bogus media hype around a fake scandal that widespread regular sexual and physical abuse of kids was perpetrated by family and coven of Satan worshipers. While this turned out to be 100% false, the doc had people talking about being raped by family memebers, something along the lines es of being curled up and placed in the hollowed out cavity of a corpse and pulled out in a kind of rebirth ritual.

The other doc that scared me was Paradise Lost about the west Memphis Trio. The descriptions of the murder messed me up.

Along with those examples, they played The Accused early one morning. I was maybe 8 and happened to land on it during the infamous rape scene. I didn't understand what sex really was so you can imagine how world shattering it is to learn that level of violation is a reality. All I knew about sex was from seeing a random inocculous Playboy or Raiders of The Lost Ark style romance (kissing and the camera moves away). So, all of sudden something mysterious, romantic, and associated as healthy became also something that bad people could use to ruin you.

I guess it made me more sensitive and empathetic to people in long run, but kids can't understand certain things and all kinds of associations and assumptions go on in their head that might be detrimental to a sense of safety in their world.

Or I'm over thinking this based on my experiences. Just my thoughts.