When children are this afraid, we must listen

There is perhaps no more sobering reality check than hearing the raw fear of a child. The words of a student living in The Ivy, St Michael—in the neighbourhood where 21-year-old Omari Jordan was gunned down in broad daylight on Monday—are not just heartbreaking; they are a siren call.

“I had to close up all the windows and everything because I don’t feel safe anymore in Barbados. I know there are places that have a lot of crimes, but I don’t feel safe no more,” the secondary school student told Barbados TODAY when a team visited the community a day after the fatal shooting.

“I pray each and every single day because I just pray to the Lord to get me to school safely and get me back safely…. I would really like to leave, like just pack up and move away if an opportunity can come

to me.”

These are not the anxious musings of a worried adult. These are the thoughts of a young girl, a student who should be worrying about exams, hobbies, friendships—not survival. Her fear, her prayers for safe passage to and from school, and her desperate wish to escape home, paint a chilling picture of life in communities where violence has become an all-too-common backdrop.

And she is not alone.

For many of our nation’s youth, gunfire is no longer a distant sound heard only in headlines. It is a lived experience, forcing them to cower in their homes, mistrust their streets, and carry the heavy emotional burden of trauma before they even reach adulthood.

When a young person says she wants to leave her country because she no longer feels safe, we must stop and ask ourselves: What kind of Barbados are we building?

This is not just a policing issue. Yes, law enforcement must be more responsive, more visible, and more trusted. But beyond that, this is a societal crisis. Violence is flourishing in the cracks we’ve left unattended—where poverty, hopelessness, lack of opportunity, broken homes, and unchecked anger collide.

Community after community, from The Ivy to the Orleans to Grazettes, has stories like these. Stories of lives lost, families broken, and youth left afraid of being in the very spaces where they should feel most secure.

We cannot afford to become numb. We cannot allow this fear to become the norm for another generation.

“It’s so scary…. I don’t feel safe no more.”

This child’s voice is not just a cry for help. It is a mirror. A reflection of the consequences of our collective inaction, our political indecision, our economic imbalances, and our fading sense of community.

If our children do not feel safe at home, we have failed them.

It is time—past time—for a unified, all-hands-on-deck approach to saving not just lives, but the sense of security and belonging that every Barbadian child deserves. From government to schools, churches, businesses, neighbourhood leaders and parents, this is everyone’s responsibility.

Because if a child in Barbados has to pray just to make it home from school, then we are all in danger of losing far more than just our safety—we’re losing our soul.