In diverse political contexts the symbolic figure of the Child is consistently used to expand or contract the carceral state. It also shapes public policies that have complex impacts on the lives of many, including those that qualify as children. This project examines how those complexities are obfuscated by representations of the Child, and invites those invested in safe futures without increased investments in policing, prisons and borders to rigorously examine how the artifact of the Child circulates in our organizing and scholarship.