A viral TikTok video with a child appearing to glorify violence draws the attention of the Office of the Children’s Advocate (OCA) and the Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA).  The video was made public on the social media platform yesterday.

The CPFSA has made a public appeal for assistance to locate the child.

In the 29 second video, the boy who appears to be 8-years-old is asked what he would like to become when he grows up.

The child responds, “gunman.”

He is then chided with laughter from persons in the background, laughing at the conversation with the videographer who appears to be a male adult and the child.

The adult then laughed and responded “No bredda!”

The child replied, “How yuh mean? Cah yuh nuh hear seh gunman kill police pon TV every day?”

The man continued to discourage the idea, “No man yuh cya be a gunman!”

To which the child responded, “But yuh cya tell mi wah fi be bredda…mi a be weh mi waah be!” the child insisted.

In an interview earlier today, Children’s Advocate Diahann Gordon Harrison said she was angered by the video.

“It seem to be an adult who was in fact recording this information and you didn’t hear anywhere on the video whereby that adult stopped the child and had a responsible age appropriate discussion with him to explain just how wrong his aspirations were,” said Harrison.

The disgruntled Children’s Advocate further described how the video personally impacted her and the underlying effects and immoral actions that this child unfortunately values.

“And then I felt pain because here is a child who clearly is very misguided, who has been exposed to violence whether directly or indirectly by hearing it in the news and so on. And who now sees it as a normal “profession” that they should in fact aspire to,” she explained.

Mrs. Harrison assures the public that every effort will be made to locate the child to provide the necessary intervention.

On the social media site TikTok on which the video was posted, many persons commented that they did not find the video humorous and calls on the necessary authorities to take action. One woman pleas to the CPFSA not to take the child away from his family but instead to provide him with counselling.

“If unu going to take that child from him parents him still going to be a gunman if him mind set on it!!! He is young so just give him a good counseling and done!! Because someone kids go in the system it’s go all upside down,” the woman urges.

Meanwhile, counselling psychologist Dr. Patrice Charles said the child’s action is learnt behaviour which is problematic in society but she’s not surprised by the video.

“I worked with so many children that have been exposed negatively to inappropriate behavior and violence and so what you are seeing, especially, like in that video is just a reaction to negative role models,” she stated.

The psychologist also pointed out how the child’s behavior towards violent news stories as he expressed in the video, is an act of glorifying gunmen.

“So obviously, this 8-year-old child has glorified and is admiring gunmen. In the video, he said don’t you see that it is gunman that’s killing police? For others, that’s supposed to be a horrific act, for him, it’s a heroic act and that’s very disturbing,” Dr. Charles explained.

In the meantime, the CPFSA is urging anyone with information that can lead to the child being located to contact the agency at 876-469-4100.

Writer- Natasha Williams