Monday 1 August 2011

Music therapy can be used to improve treatment of depression, at least in the short term, say researchers in Finland.

The technique used non-verbal communication to help patients express their emotions.
A study on 79 people, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, showed a greater improvement than in patients receiving standard therapy.
British experts said music may engage people in ways that words cannot.
Music therapists are used, including by the NHS, to help children who struggle to communicate. Playing instruments and singing with a trained music therapist is supposed to help children express themselves.
Initial improvement In this study, all patients with depression recieved the standard practice of counselling and appropriate medication. Thirty three of them were also given 20 sessions with a trained music therapist, which involved things such as drumming.
After three months, patients recieving music therapy showed a greater improvement in scores of anxiety and depression than the other set of patients.
However, there was no statistical improvement after six months.
Professor Christian Gold, from the University of Jyväskylä, said: "Our trial has shown that music therapy, when added to standard care helps people to improve their levels of depression and anxiety."
"Music therapy has specific qualities that allow people to express themselves and interact in a non-verbal way - even in situations when they cannot find the words to describe their inner experiences.
Dr Mike Crawford, who specialises in mental health services at Imperial College London, said in a journal editorial: "The results suggest that it can improve the mood and general functioning of people with depression.
"Music-making is social, pleasurable and meaningful. It has been argued that music making engages people in ways that words may simply not be able to."
@'BBC'

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Scotland Yard Identifies (Alleged) LulzSec Hacker

Via
The teenage hacker arrested last week in the U.K. for his alleged involvement with Anonymous and LulzSec is reportedly an 18-year-old named Jake Davis.
Scotland Yard on Sunday revealed that the hacker known as "Topiary" is actually Davis, from the U.K.'s Shetland Islands, according to security firm Sophos and Daily Mail crime reporter Chris Greenwood.
Davis will appear in a London court on Monday morning, Greenwood tweeted.
Scotland Yard has not yet posted any new information about the case since the Wednesday arrest. In a Sunday blog post, however, Sophos' Graham Cluley said Davis has five charges against him:

Unauthorized access to a computer system, contrary to Section 3 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990.

Encouraging / assisting offences, contrary to S46 of the Serious Crime Act 2007.

Conspiracy with others to carry out a Distributed Denial of Service Attack on the Web site of the Serious and Organised Crime Agency contrary to S1 Criminal Law Act 1977.

Conspiracy to commit offences of section 3 Computer Misuse Act 1990, contrary to S1 Criminal Law Act 1977.

Conspiracy between the defendant and others to commit offences of section 3 Computer Misuse Act 1990 contrary to S1 Criminal Law Act 1977.

Cluley also said a source told him Davis is an "avid online chess player" and was arrested on the northern island of Yell. "Frankly, it's hard to imagine a more remote place in the British Isles to be," he wrote.
Last week, Scotland Yard said it had arrested a man who "is believed to be linked to an ongoing international investigation in to the criminal activity of the so-called 'hacktivist' groups Anonymous and LulzSec, and uses the online nickname 'Topiary' which is presented as the spokesperson for the groups."
The day after that announcement, the LulzSec Exposed blog said Scotland Yard had arrested the wrong person because its evidence suggested that Topiary was actually a 22-year-old Swedish man named Daniel Sandberg. That, however, has not been confirmed.
As PCMag pointed out in a recent overview of the key LulzSec players, Topiary is reportedly second-in-command within LulzSec, though he is thought to be the least tech-savvy in the group. As a result, he acted as a PR liaison for Anonymous before moving over to LulzSec.
He recently deleted posts from the @atopiary Twitter account; it now only has one tweet from July 21: its new "You cannot arrest an idea" tagline. The bio on that Twitter page says Topiary is a "simple prankster turned swank garden hedge [who] worked with Anonymous, LulzSec, and other such paragons of intense cyber victory. You are free."
The @LulzSec Twitter feed has not been updated since July 27, the day of Davis' arrest. A recent tweet from the @AnonymousIRC feed encouraged officials, in all caps, to free Topiary and other hackers who have been arrested in recent weeks, including "tflow."
Members of Anonymous and LulzSec have been arrested throughout the world in recent months, including Spain, Turkey, the U.K., the Netherlands, and the United States. In retaliation, Anonymous recently organized a boycott of PayPal, though the company said that effort had little effect.
Chloe Albanesius @'PC Mag'

Sunday 31 July 2011

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Louisiana’s Angola 3: 100 Years of Solitude

Thirty nine years ago, three young black men were put in solitary confinement. Two are still there.
Collectively they have spent more than 100 years in isolation, most of it at the notorious Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola.
The “Angola 3″ maintain they were targeted for speaking out against inhumane treatment and racial segregation in the prison, and are now fighting for justice and recognition of their cruel, endless years in the hole.
Albert Woodfox and Herman Wallace, originally convicted of unrelated cases of armed robbery, were convicted of the murder of a prison guard in 1972. Robert King, locked up for robbery, was also convicted of murder once he was in the prison. The most fortunate of the three, his conviction was overturned in 2001, and he was released after 29 years of isolation.
Meanwhile, the continued detention of Woodfox and Wallace showcases the failing of the Louisiana justice system. In a new report, Amnesty International notes that no physical evidence links Woodfox and Wallace to the murder. On top of that, potentially favorable DNA evidence was lost. The convictions were based on questionable inmate testimony. Best of all, it seems prison officials bribed the main eyewitness into giving statements against the men. Even the widow of the prison guard has expressed skepticism, saying in 2008,

“If they did not do this – and I believe that they didn’t – they have been living a nightmare for 36 years!”

I’m not sure what is most disturbing: that Louisiana has allowed these men to languish on seemingly-fabricated charges? That Woodfox and Wallace, now senior citizens with clean conduct records, are characterized as potential threats? Or that by holding the men under such tight quarters, the state has been in breach of its own prison policies for the past 15 years? The so called “nature of the original reason for lockdown” is no longer allowed to hold a prisoner in isolation, yet it has been invoked more than 150 times for these men.
Woodfox and Wallace watch life pass them from spaces barely larger than my bathroom. Eventually moved from Angola to two other prisons, they are allowed outside three hours a week in a small cage. For four more hours they can shower or walk alone along the corridor. Visits and telephone calls are few. According to their lawyers, this has contributed to a host of health problems, including osteoarthritis, hypertension and insomnia.
Woodfox’s murder conviction has been overturned twice, once by a U.S. district judge, and a State Judicial Commission recommended that Wallace’s conviction be reversed — but appeals and a refusal to see the light have kept the men in hell. As they fight their murder convictions, the Angola 3 are suing Louisiana authorities, asserting that their prolonged isolation is cruel and unusual punishment and violates the U.S. Constitution.
We can support their fight. Write LA Governor Bobby Jindal and, if he doesn’t act, contact U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. Remind them that the United States has ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the United Nations Convention against Torture, and that this insane confinement also contravenes the U.N. Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.
This is not a hopeless case. As Robert King said,

“I do believe that there is something that can be done and a pro-active position in the case can help… The ripples in the pond are increasing and we need to see some waves… and these are the things that keep me going. I can see the waves coming from the ripples.”

Wende Gozan Brown @'Human Rights Now'

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Afghans Rage at Young Lovers; A Father Says Kill Them Both

The two teenagers met inside an ice cream factory through darting glances before roll call, murmured hellos as supervisors looked away and, finally, a phone number folded up and tossed discreetly onto the workroom floor.
It was the beginning of an Afghan love story that flouted dominant traditions of arranged marriages and close family scrutiny, a romance between two teenagers of different ethnicities that tested a village’s tolerance for more modern whims of the heart. The results were delivered with brutal speed.
This month, a group of men spotted the couple riding together in a car, yanked them into the road and began to interrogate the boy and girl. Why were they together? What right had they? An angry crowd of 300 surged around them, calling them adulterers and demanding that they be stoned to death or hanged.
When security forces swooped in and rescued the couple, the mob’s anger exploded. They overwhelmed the local police, set fire to cars and stormed a police station six miles from the center of Herat, raising questions about the strength of law in a corner of western Afghanistan and in one of the first cities that has made the formal transition to Afghan-led security.
The riot, which lasted for hours, ended with one man dead, a police station charred and the two teenagers, Halima Mohammedi and her boyfriend, Rafi Mohammed, confined to juvenile prison. Officially, their fates lie in the hands of an unsteady legal system. But they face harsher judgments of family and community...

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Jack Healy @'NYT'

Remember...

What the NYT Magazine Doesn't Say About James O'Keefe

As a longtime observer of James O'Keefe, the right-leaning provocateur best known for his hidden video stings, I am frustrated by the profile about him just published in The New York Times Magazine. The writer, Zev Chafets, capably sketches his subject's biography, and correctly intuits that any worthwhile feature story on the 27-year-old must grapple with the ethical questions raised by his activism. But the grappling is woefully incomplete, leaving readers unaware of the most damning critiques of O'Keefe's work and unable to render an informed judgment.
Totally absent is any mention of CNN Correspondent Abbie Boudreau, who contacted O'Keefe in 2010. At O'Keefe's bidding, she traveled to Maryland, expecting to interview him. But he and his team had other plans. It was their intention to lure her onto a boat where O'Keefe would be waiting below deck, hidden camera rolling. In planning documents obtained by CNN, there was a list of potential props: "condom jar, dildos, posters and paintings of naked women, fuzzy handcuffs."
O'Keefe later claimed he didn't approve such props. In any case, once he got her down there alone, he planned to make her uncomfortable by attempting to seduce her. Then he'd somehow humiliate Boudrea and embarrass CNN by releasing footage of the bizarre incident. It was averted at the last minute when a female member of O'Keefe's team became uncomfortable with the plan, and tipped off the reporter to what was intended. In the aftermath of the incident, which made national headlines when it happened, publisher Andrew Breitbart commented, "From what I've read about this script, though not executed, it is patently gross and offensive. It's not his detractors to whom he also owes this public airing. It's to his legion of supporters."
A profile writer can't include every detail of his subject's life. But surely a piece that touches on the propriety of O'Keefe's work and the evolution of his relationship with Breitbart should've mentioned a major incident that bears on both, especially because it shows something other anecdotes don't: that O'Keefe is willing to use subterfuge and mock his subjects even when there is no wrongdoing to uncover...