Nip crime by youth in the bud

Juvenile crime is a matter of grave concern which must be addressed by authorities urgently.

Chief Executive Officer of Supreme Counselling Shawn Clarke said recent instances of crime among juveniles have raised alarms which must be addressed. He said with the exception of the stabbing to death of 19-year-old Shaundra Davidson at her Waterhall Land, St Michael home allegedly by a ten-year-old, the majority of cases can be linked to cyber bullying or physical bullying.

Clarke, a certified sociologist and counsellor said the time has come for officials to begin to pay serious attention to the issue of bullying and its detrimental impact on society.

“This is happening with persons between ten and 15 years old which is saying to us that we are living in a society that is crying out for help and that we need to put the mechanisms and the systems in place that will give these young people the help that they need. Incarceration is not necessarily the answer. I agree with community service to make them give back, but we cannot leave counselling out,” Clarke said.

“It can be counselling first and foremost at the individual level, but there must also be some family therapy involved. This is a situation that we can no longer overlook. We can no longer just see it as something that is happening. We can no longer see this situation as just a one-off event because one and one is two and two and two are four. We really need to pay attention to what is happening within society at this present point in time,” he added.

In July Keishawn Thomas was at the centre of a cyber bullying video that went viral after the initial video of an interview with Thomas following the common entrance examination was doctored to omit the young man correcting himself following a grammatical mistake.

Public outrage has been strong after ten-year-old Demarco Gibbs, was struck in the head with pieces of wood by four of his peers. He is now on life support at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH).

Meanwhile, today, two teenagers issued public apologies for abusing several homeless and elderly men last week. Their actions were shared in video recordings which subsequently went viral.

Clarke said in the past, Barbadians heard of such behaviour taking place overseas, however, the issues are now happening in Barbados and just talking is no longer enough.

“I heard the Minister of Youth Dwight Sutherland, recently saying that Barbados needs to get a systematic approach to bullying in schools and I want it to be known that since 2013, Supreme Counselling through Shawn Clarke introduced a programme to Barbados called the National Olweus Bullying Prevention.

“It is the most systematic bullying prevention programme in the world. It is the most researched bullying prevention programme in the world and once it is implemented in its entirety and you follow what is done, you find the programme is working,” he said.

Clarke indicated that while the programme can be found in just a few schools in Barbados, it needs more than just being endorsed by the Ministry of Education and other relevant public and private sector agencies. He said National Olweus Bullying Prevention should be introduced at all schools across Barbados to spearhead the national initiative to address the issue of bullying.

“This is what the Ministry of Youth is asking for but it is already here. All we need to do is get together and make it work. And we need to teach our young people about conflict resolution through counselling. We need to teach our young people about anger management and I have been saying this time and time again. We need to teach our young people about empathy and that you just cannot go and see a vagrant or homeless person and take advantage of them.

“We need to put programmes and mechanisms in place and we need to let them reach where they need to reach. The authorities need to reach out to organisations that can help handle this situation because it is not one that the Government can handle on its own,” Clarke said. anestahenry@barbadostoday.bb