Sesame Street turns 50: The iconic kids' program has survived by showing true reality television

Fast Company

Despite premiering 50 years ago on Nov. 10, 1969, Sesame Street has managed to transcend most children's programming. "Sesame Street has survived and grown for half a century for doing something that even now still feels bold: showing real people and the messy reality of real life, says Kathleen Davis. "Part of what made Sesame Street so revolutionary was not just depicting poor and working-class people of all shades as regular people in your neighborhood, but also tackling the most difficult and painful parts of life so unflinchingly. For Sesame Street, issues like homelessness, drug abuse, AIDS, natural disasters, terrorism, incarceration, divorce, and death have never been neatly resolved with pat after-school-special-like answers. Instead, with the help of child psychologists and education experts, the show explains to children how to understand life’s most perplexing and difficult moments and helps give the adults in their lives the tools to have age-appropriate conversations."

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