Children Are Innocent/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: Children are innocents in need of adult protection and are never evil.

  • Played Straight: Nine-year-old Cindy is very naïve and would never think to deliberately harm someone.
  • Exaggerated: Cindy still wears a diaper and speaks in Baby Talk. See Kiddie Kid.
  • Downplayed: Cindy would hurt someone, but not severely and only for childish reasons.
  • Justified: Children's minds are still developing, as is their understanding of the world.
  • Inverted: Adults Are Useless.
  • Subverted: Cindy is an Enfant Terrible who plays the part of a Deliberately Cute Child.
  • Double Subverted: This was caused by Demonic Possession and the real Cindy is innocent.
  • Deconstructed: Bob knows that Cindy is evil and a threat to society, but no one takes him seriously since it looks like he's just picking on an innocent child.
  • Reconstructed: Cindy is found to be disturbingly capable of great crimes. She's not considered truly responsible because she's a child and she's successfully rehabilitated through therapy.
  • Parodied: Everyone is as innocent as a three-year-old until the second they turn eighteen.
  • Lampshaded: "How could you hurt Cindy, Bob?! She's only nine!"
  • Zig Zagged: At times, Cindy seems surprisingly worldly, but there are also those moments which remind you she's still a kid.
  • Averted: Cindy is no more innocent than the adult characters.
  • Enforced: "The Moral Guardians will hurt us if we don't make Cindy happy and innocent."
  • Invoked: Alice ensures that Cindy stays innocent by only letting her watch G-rated movies and so forth.
  • Defied: Alice trains Cindy to be a Little Miss Badass so that she'll be able to fend for herself in a harsh world.
  • Discussed: "We can't let Cindy be exposed to this because it'll ruin her development."
  • Conversed: "Why is Cindy just sitting there when they need as many people as possible to pull on the rope? She should be able to handle that even if she's just a kid."
  • Played For Laughs: Cindy says the darndest things.
  • Played For Drama: Cindy must be protected from a villain who Would Hurt a Child.

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