I'm no expert, just a mother of four. And those words out of the mouth of a 6 year old don't ring true.
"Mummy, I'm okay but all my friends are dead."
I have a hard time believing that a child of that age, just having seen her classmates shot, would consider the fears of her parents and say "I'm okay". Their world is about them, especially when in shock.
And what American child refers to her mother as "Mummy"? Sounds like a British term.
And "all my friends" .... "All" as in every last one of them? And were all the victims this child's friend?
I doubt it. But I don't doubt for a moment that someone would manufacture this heartrending "statement" for political purposes, though.
To be fair, the pastor in the interview didn’t say “mummy”, I suspect the British proof reader spell checker automatically corrected it without thinking about it. You do know spell checkers have UK and AM versions of spell check, don’t you?
I also am the mother of four (three of them girls). While it would be perfectly normal for a six year old to consider her entire class her friends, it’s first grade, not junior high, for pity’s sake... we don’t know that the child was referring to the entire class, she may have meant her all her friends in that class were dead. It’s a simple statement that adults read more into than a child would.
And yes, a child would refer to being physically unhurt as I’m okay. Kids don’t necessarily recognize or speak about emotional trauma immediately. Their world is more immediately physical, which is why kids don’t do delay gratification well and why we call adults who also don’t do it well as childish or immature.