Word.ws English Dictionary

thinking of the children

thinking of the children is the present participle and gerund of think of the children.

Meaning of think of the children

Verb

think of the children (third-person singular simple present thinks of the children, present participle thinking of the children, simple past and past participle thought of the children)

  1. (imperative, usually) An appeal to suspend rational consideration of an issue owing to its presumptive negative effects on the young and impressionable; usually in ironic or mocking parody of another's argumentum ad passiones or moral panic.
    • For quotations using this term, see Citations:think of the children.
  2. (imperative, usually) A sincere plea to consider the young.
    • Mrs Banks: Katie Nanna, I beseech you. Please reconsider. Think of the children. Think of Mr Banks. He was just beginning to get used to you.1964, Bill Walsh et al., Mary Poppins, Walt Disney Pictures

Questions about thinking of the children

What is thinking of the children the present participle and gerund of?
Thinking of the children is the present participle and gerund of think of the children.

Words near thinking of the children in the dictionary

  1. thinking much of
  2. thinking no end of oneself
  3. thinking nothing of
  4. thinking of
  5. thinking of England
  6. thinking of the children
  7. thinking on
  8. thinking on one's feet
  9. thinking one hung the moon
  10. thinking one is God's own cousin
  11. thinking one is it

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: thinking of the children (page history and authors); think of the children (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “thinking of the children.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/thinking_of_the_children. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.