By Y’Anad Burrell

The UC Berkeley Cal Bears Women’s Basketball team has a new fireball of energy and excellence by way of sophomore Jayda Curry. While she is a star basketball player, her motto is GOD, FAMILY, HOOP — in that order.
Jayda was born in Corona, California, and has played basketball since age four. Growing up, she would play golf with her father occasionally, but Jayda gravitated to basketball along with her sister Layla Curry, who plays for LMU. Jayda chose a unique academic track studying American Studies with an emphasis on Interdisciplinary Studies (ISF), where students choose the classes they would like, which can cross multiple disciplines.
Jayda shared that her priorities in life are consistent and have not changed even with her popularity as a star basketball player. Her faith in God keeps her grounded, and she has an extensive gospel song playlist on her phone and a routine of not listening to rap music before Noon every day. Instead, her music therapy playlist has many songs from several religious genres of music and a short list of her favorite artists: Marvin Sapp, Jessica Reedy, Jonathan McReynolds, Kirk Franklin and many others.
Athletes often have the challenge of balancing their mental health and sports careers, and Jayda found a balance through journaling, something she has done for a long time, well before entering college. Finding a healthy balance with academic success is often, as well, a challenge for athletes. Jayda attributes her success in this area to good time management. Staying tenacious about studying and completing school assignments while on the road with the team has become a habit that gives Jayda academic success while performing at a high level on the basketball court.
Jayda cherishes her love for family and shares how deep down she is truly a ‘kid at heart.’ A Lego wonderland moment and enjoy hanging out with family, teammates, and friends is the best for Jayda on any given day.
Jayda has many athletes that she admires. To name just a few, they are
Candice Parker, Sirena Williams, Gabi Douglas, Steph Curry, Damion Lillard and many more. It was no surprise to hear that she would like play for the WNBA one day, but succeeding in college is just as important to Jayda.
Jayda is well on her way to gracing the national stage while fulfilling her dreams and aspirations, given the path she has chosen and thus far managed well. Soon she may be another big name in basketball for other up and comers to admire.
But her fashion career is happening in real-time, not in Jayda’s future. She launched an apparel collection that can be found in Oakland stores and online at www.jaydacurry.com. Jayda’s collection will also be available in stores in her hometown of Corona.

By Edward Henderson, California Black Media

Last week, the State Assembly voted 51-0 to pass a bill that, if the state Senate approves, would open the door for parents whose children are addicted to social media to sue companies like Tik Tok and Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram.

Assemblymembers Jordan Cunningham (R-San Luis Obispo County) and Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) co-authored the legislation, Assembly Bill (AB) 2408.

The bill’s language defines ‘addiction’ as children under 18 who are “both harmed – either physically, mentally, emotionally, developmentally or materially – and who want to stop or reduce how much time they spend on social media but can’t because they are preoccupied or obsessed with it.”

Cunningham says evidence of social media addiction affecting children is well documented and it’s time to hold social media companies accountable.

“According to whistleblowers, certain social media companies have been designing their products to get children addicted. The results have been calamitous for our youth: anxiety, eating disorders, body dysmorphia, depression, and loneliness,” he said.

“It’s time we treat the dangers of youth social media addiction with the level of seriousness it warrants,” Cunningham continued.

Wicks says as the mother of two daughters, the bill is particularly relevant for her.

“For every parent like me who is anxiously watching their children grow older in the digital world, there are millions of others whose teens (and often, even younger kids) are already experiencing the mental health impacts of a system that has a moral responsibility to protect them,” she said. “Our No. 1 job as legislators is to protect the health and safety of Californians — especially our kids and teens — and I’m proud to jointly author this bill that takes that responsibility as seriously as it deserves.”

The bill permits parents to sue for up to $25,000 per violation. If proven that a company intentionally created products that were meant to be addictive to children, they could face an additional $250,000 civil penalty.

Only social media companies that have had at least $100 million in gross revenue would be liable under the proposal. It would not apply to streaming companies like Netflix and Disney Plus.

If passed, AB 2408 will also allow guardians and the California Attorney General to sue social media companies.

The bill has drawn opposition from several business groups including the California Chamber of Commerce and TechNet, a network of tech CEOs and executives.

They argue that the bill would impose an “unimaginable civil liability” on social media platforms and “interferes with the expressive rights of both the minors who will be banned from social media services and the service providers themselves.”

TechNet alleges that the bill is unfair and extra-legal.

“There is no social media company, let alone any business that could tolerate that legal risk, especially considering how much this bill puts the thumb on the scales of justice for plaintiffs,” TechNet wrote in opposition.

If the bill becomes law, it will take effect on Jan. 1, 2023. Then, social media companies would have until April 1 to remove features deemed addictive to children to not be held liable.

Also, companies that conduct regular audits of their practices and features to identify products or offerings that could be addictive to children would be immune from lawsuits.

AB 2408 is now headed to the State Senate for review.

By Congressman James E. Clyburn (D-SC), House Majority Whip

Lady Justice is an iconic symbol of the American judicial system. In one hand, she holds scales to represent that both sides will receive a balanced hearing, and, in the other, she holds a sword to represent the power of justice. She also wears a blindfold to indicate that justice is blind and, therefore, fair. However, that fairness is not reflected in the makeup of our courts. In fact, one might say Lady Justice’s blindfold prevents her from seeing the imbalance on current federal benches.

March, the month we celebrate women’s history, I believe is an appropriate time to take a good look at the status of women in our judicial system. We all know that representation matters, and the federal judiciary has been sorely lacking on this front.

During the 2020 Presidential campaign, I often heard expressions of displeasure that there had never been a Black woman on the U.S. Supreme Court, nor had one ever been seriously considered. That is why I believed it to be appropriate and timely that then-candidate Joe Biden pledge during the South Carolina primary that, if given the opportunity, he would nominate a Black woman to the highest court in the land. He made the pledge during the South Carolina presidential debate and went on to win the state’s primary by almost 30 points gaining the momentum that took him to the White House. His victory was due in large part to the support of Black women.

President Biden has upheld his pledge and has nominated the highly qualified and well-respected Ketanji Brown Jackson. If confirmed, she will be a tremendous addition to the Supreme Court and bring a different life experience to the bench than has ever been there. It is not just the Supreme Court that is struggling to reflect the diversity of our country. Of the current 1,395 federal judges, only 8 percent are women of color, and just 4 percent are Black women. In fact, the 4^th Circuit Court of Appeals, which represents states with a combined Black population of 20 percent, has no women of color.

This issue is not new to me. When I was elected Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus 24 years ago, I declared it my mission to integrate that Court and went toe-to-toe with North Carolina Senator and well-known segregationist, Jesse Helms. Senator Helms had blocked earlier attempts by President Clinton to integrate that Circuit and even attempted to reduce its size to get rid of the two vacancies.

The battle was public and not pretty. An editorial writer from my hometown newspaper declared that it was a dispute I could not win. But I developed a scenario that convinced President Clinton to make a recess appointment and Judge Roger Gregory of Virginia became the first Black person on the 4^th Circuit Court of Appeals in December 2000. Today Judge Gregory serves as the Chief Judge on that court.

President Biden has made it his mission to create even greater diversity on the federal bench, especially for women. In his first year in office, women of color have represented more than 40 percent of President Biden’s federal judicial nominees. As of January 2022, the Senate has confirmed 22 of his minority women appointees to the federal bench, 7 minority men, 11 white women and 2 white men. That is a significant effort toward smashing a larger hole in the glass ceiling of the federal judiciary.

You might ask: when will there be enough women of color on the federal bench? I will borrow my answer from a famous response offered by the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to a similar question – with a slight modification. She said at Georgetown Law School in 2015, “I’m sometimes asked, ‘When will there be enough?’ and my answer is, ‘When there are nine.’ People are shocked. But there’d been nine men, and nobody’s ever raised a question about that.”

I think Justice Ginsburg made an appropriate observation.

The post OP-ED: Let’s celebrate Women History Month by adjusting Lady Justice’s Blindfold first appeared on BlackPressUSA.