Aged 16, Damoie Byfield is recalling the day he had to run for his life, jumping into a gully just as a gunman’s bullet grazed his chest. He’s telling it so vividly, and with such a knowing smile that his mother Shian Leslie is finding it hard to hold back not tears, but actually laughter – relief that her son survived. If that… Read more →←
Topic: Safety and justice
COVID-19 has challenged us at Fight for Peace to stay in touch with all the children and youth we had been giving face-to-face support. For people who live in the downtown Kingston communities where our Psycho-social Support Team works, one of the biggest challenges is access to services. Their mental health is no different, and a time… Read more →←
“It brings us together, it teaches us how to participate and it teaches us how to protect ourselves.” – 13-year-old Alphanso Edwards from Fletcher’s Land, a participant in the taekwondo programme by UP Unity & Peace. On a hot, still Friday in downtown Kingston residents are awakening from the peak of the lockdown necessitated… Read more →←
My father died a week ago. He wasn’t always a part of my life and when we reasoned, a lot of times he would say, ‘Listen I wasn’t the father I was supposed to be at your age,’ but at least I made him proud in showing the difference a father can make for his children. I was angry at him growing up, especially when I would be sent… Read more →←
COVID-19 has taught me that if we have some amount of courage, and if we are kind to others, then we will be able to see the world not as it is, but as what the world can be. I left my community of 8 Miles, St. Ann at the age of 15 to go into state care, and my relationship with people there and my family was something I wanted to… Read more →←
U-Report recently polled young Jamaicans on their views about fears of a potential increase in domestic abuse due to stay-at-home conditions during COVID-19, and to ask their advice to inform a project for the Spotlight Initiative – a partnership between the United Nations, the European Union and the Government of Jamaica to reduce… Read more →←
COVID-19 is an uncomfortable but opportune moment for us to confront serious and longstanding social issues in Jamaica, like violence against women and children. At Araba Scott Children’s Foundation we’ve been adapting our usual programme in St. Thomas, to help those in quarantine until we are able to gather properly again. Between… Read more →←
I do not come across negativity on my social media platforms. Reading that I’m sure you are asking why that happens and, I do also hope, ‘How can I do that, or show my children how?’ For those of you who may not follow me, I’m a voracious user of social media, especially on Instagram, Linkedin and on Twitter. Paying it… Read more →←
The reason I believe in talking to my children … beating doesn’t work! Sometimes when you beat them, you beat them with anger, you beat them with vengeance, and when you tell yourself that you’re licking them here on the arm, it might catch them in the eye – scrape them, leave bruises, welts, marks and all those things. Talking… Read more →←
“I share my story here today for every girl and every boy in Jamaica who is subjected to sexual violence, and they are everywhere. There are children who are keeping horrible secrets in Upper St. Andrew, in downtown Kingston, and all across rural Jamaica” As I listened to Shaneille speak, my eyes welled up with tears. Her voice,… Read more →←