Placebo effect beats God, Prozac

By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

This is the story of three drugs. Except one is not really a drug at all and is merely an illusion, a nifty construct, an intense belief that it might be a drug, even though, as mentioned, it is very much not. We just think it is. Isn’t that strange? Wonderful? Both?

The three drugs — which, sorry, are not so much drugs as they are modes of comprehending our own weird little minds, needs and inherent psychoses — are presented here by way of two recent studies that essentially reinforce what similar studies have been declaring for years and decades and, in the second case, since the ancient mystics suckled wild plants in the forest, licked God, found the source of the soul, and said, you know, holy f–.

Let’s lay it out: According to a major new overview study, all of America’s beloved wonderdrug antidepressants — all the Prozacs, Paxils, Effexors, Zolofts of the world — are essentially useless and don’t really work worth a damn.

Wait, that’s not quite right. They can sort of work just fine, help millions of people and have enjoyed tremendous success. But there’s a huge caveat: Statistically speaking, all these drugs work no better — and often are far worse for you — than sugar pills, fake pills, placebos that patients only think are powerful, mind-altering compounds, but which in fact are no more chemically miraculous than a peppermint Altoid.

Have you heard this before? Of course you have. The placebo effect has been known for years. Decades. Forever. It’s one of those hotly controversial, yet irrefutable medical/psychological wonders that we don’t have the slightest clue how to unravel, much less leverage. And hence, it just freaks us the hell out.

Nevertheless, the recent findings, the result of one of the most comprehensive studies in recent years, are still nothing short of astounding. A sugar pill works as well as a hit of Prozac, if the patient believes she’s getting the latter? It’s just all sorts of confounding, in how it reveals how the power of the mind is still, to this day, barely understood, untapped, wildly feral, far more brightly powerful than we know what to do with.

It also reveals just how deeply invested massive drug companies are in convincing everyone they can “cure” depression with powerful, often dangerous chemical alternatives, how fearful doctors are of refuting this, how reluctant patients are to understand the difference, and how, above all else, nothing is as it seems.

Problem is, it ain’t just the pills. The placebo effect — hereby defined as the sheer force of will and belief, of the mind’s (and heart’s) ability to heal and nurture itself sans external assistance — applies to all sorts of constructs in our tortured modern world.

Organized religion? Hell yes. Is your life flawed and painful? Are you guilt-ridden and terrified of the world’s swarm of demons and daggers? Of course you are, sinner. Here, have a giant, unknowable deity. Give to it all your faith, hope, belief, money, angst, sexual shame. Believe in it wholly and without doubt, to the point where you lose a sense of yourself and your true divine source, forever and ever, amen.

There now. Feel better? Are miracles starting to happen in your life? Do you feel uplifted and joyful? Are you healed? It’s the power of Jesus! It’s God in your life! It’s because you have blind faith! No no no, it’s not you, silly. Even though, in fact, it totally is. Shhh.

Of course, what we call the power of faith is just the power of the mind, soul, the Self, rather harshly rerouted through some external conduit that relieves us from having to figure s–t out for ourselves. After all, it’s just much easier to give it all over to the god, the pill, the product, than it is to delve deep into one’s own dark and inscrutable psyche. Same as it ever was.

But whatever works, right? If expensive pills genuinely help millions, who’s to argue? If devout belief gives you stability and a sense of place, what’s wrong with that? It’s all well and good… until you factor in the cost.

The organized religion racket rakes in hundreds of billions a year, and requires a massive toll in guilt, shame, dogma, homophobia, war, pedophilia and sexual hysteria. The antidepressant market runs $10 billion a year and makes millions into casual addicts, convincing many they are powerless to get better without chemical assistance.

The placebo market is, at last check, absolutely free. Man, they just hate that.

Behold, study number two. This research reveals another time-honored truth that science is only now beginning to barely get a grip on, albeit nervously, suspiciously. Few want to claim it or ponder what it might mean to how we define illness, consciousness, God, the sanctity of the DSM-IV.

This research reveals, once again for the millionth time, that various psychedelics like MDMA, LSD and psilocybin really do, in fact, have a rather stunningly helpful — and often permanent — effect on the health and well-being of numerous patients, almost universally and without fail.

(Did you hear that? That’s the sound of a million mystics and healers, teachers and gurus throughout history, sighing and rolling their eyes).

Of these drugs’ power to dance and frolic with the brain’s synapses, there is absolutely no doubt. This is no placebo effect. This is no sheer force of will. Psilocybin, for one, is an E-ticket to a shifting dimension, a dance on the blurrier edges of definitive reality. Ecstasy is a widening out, a warming up, an opening into the cold, cold heart of the human species.

Patients who get to dabble with these fine plants and chemicals are reporting astonishingly positive, almost impossibly curative reactions. Lives are forever altered. Ideas of the soul, heart, human connection forever reset and restored. Possibilities expand, PTSD contracts, hearts open, fear and inhibition dissolve. Love expands. And man, the PTB hate that, too.

Do you know why? Two reasons: One: No one holds the patent to these drugs. No one company stands to rake in billions if, say, MDMA is somehow decriminalized. Two: Science loves reliable data, anchor points, the flawed sturdiness of the scientific method. But when it comes to hallucinogens and psychotropics, it’s all just a delightful, slippery mess. The swim and swirl of consciousness, it would appear, just refuses to be pinned down.

The grand upshot: We are but infants. We hammer and prod at the brain, the self, inundate it with chemicals and blast it with terminology to try and get it to behave and respond in somewhat predictable ways. And yet, the ancient plants, the mystical connections they offer to that original source seem to prove one irrefutable point: We still have a long, long way to go to get back to where we started.

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Libya: Stop Blocking Independent Web Sites

(New York) – Libya’s moves in late January, 2010, to block access to at least seven independent and opposition Libyan web sites based abroad and to YouTube is a disturbing step awayfrom press freedom, Human Rights Watch said today. The government should restore web site access immediately, Human Rights Watch said.

“These web sites were the one recent sign of tangible progress in freedom ofexpression in Libya,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, “The government is returning to the dark days of total media control.” On January 24, Libyans woke to find that they could no longer access independent and opposition Libyan web sites based abroad,such as Libya Al Youm, Al Manara, Jeel Libya, Akhbar Libya,and Libya Al Mostakbal, which had become major sources of news. With editors based abroad and journalists in Tripoli and Benghazi,these web sites regularly publish news on sensitive political subjects,including human rights abuses by the Libyan government. In its December 2009report, “Truth and Justice Can’t Wait,” Human Rights Watch pointed to their availability and the ability of their journalists to operate out of Libya as tentative signs of expanded press freedom. In addition, the entire YouTube web site is no longer available in Libya. It recently featured videos of demonstrations in Benghazi by families of prisoners who were killed in Abu Salim prison in 1996, which the authorities have never investigated, as well as videos of family members of Mu’ammar al-Gaddafi, Libya’sleader, at parties.

A group of Libyan bloggers, journalists, and rights defenders have started anonline campaign on Facebook, called “No to the Policy of Blocking Websites in Libya,” and haveshared proxy servers to allow access to the blocked web sites. A Libyan blogger,Gaida El Tawati, told Human Rights Watch that the group had submitted acomplaint to the Gaddafi Foundation’s Human Rights Society and to LTT, the main internet service provider in Libya. Editors of the blocked websites have said that people in Libya are still accessing their websites through proxies, but that access has decreased.

“Libya can stick its head in the sand and try to block the free flow of electronic information to its citizens, but the goodnews is we all know they’ll fail,” said Whitson. “Whether in China or Saudi Arabia or Libya, citizens will always find ways to exchange knowledge and information, with or without their government’s consent.” In another move, on January 21, the country’s only two private newspapers, Oea and Quryna, announced that they would appear online only, following a decision by the General Press Authority to refuse to continue printing them for what it said were financial reasons. The suspension of print-runs for the country’s two private papers raises serious concerns about access to independent information in the country. Mohamed Be’yu, the director of the General Press Authority, told Al Jazeera on January 21 that  it would no longer print the two private newspapers because of the failure of Al Ghad, the company that owns the papers, to pay a debt of 3 million Libyan Dinars (US $2.4 million) in printing costs.  

In a January 23 statement, the General Press Authority said it would continue to “support” Oea and Quryna despite the many “professional and substantive deviances” that it said characterized their work, but would not print the papers because of the supposed debt. It did not make public any information about whether the newspapers dispute this debt, how long the alleged debt has been owed, or any attempts to resolve the financial dispute.

However, the National Organization for Libyan Youth, an organization affiliated with Al Ghad, strongly criticized the decision in a January 27 statement, saying that the General Press Authority’sclaims of debt and financial trouble were untrue. It said the reason the Press Authority had refused to continue printing Oea and Quryna was because of the “unauthorized” news Oeahad printed, saying that Mohamed Al Zawwi, a close associate of the Libyan leader, would take over the General People’s Congress, Libya’s nominal governing body.  

In what appears to be a partial resolution of the situation, on February 3, Mahmoud Bousifi, the editor of Oea, toldHuman Rights Watch that they would resume printing smaller sections of the newspaper next week.

The Al Ghad company, a private Libyan company closely affiliated with Saifal-Islam al-Gaddafi, the Libyan leader’s son, started publishing Oea andQuryna in August 2007. They are the first privately owned newspapers in Libya since Gaddafi came to power. The newspapers have reported about corruption, the lack of independence of the judiciary, and demonstrations by families of prisoners killed in the Abu Salim massacre.  In November, Oea published an interview with Justice Secretary Mostafa Abdel jelil in which he criticized the security services for failing to respect the rule of law, saying that there were “more than 500 prisoners who were acquitted by courts in June 2008 and are yet to be released.”

“Libyan authorities should be increasing the number of private newspapers rather than stopping their circulation,” Whitson said. “It’s hard for anyone to believe that the government has stopped printing these newspapers because of the relatively minor financial debt it claims, and not because of the content.” Blocking access to web sites and restricting newspaper publishing violates Libya’s obligations under international law, Human Rights Watch said. Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, ratified by Libya in 1986, guarantees that, “[e]very individual shall have the right to receive information,” and that “every individual shall have the right to express and disseminate his opinions within the law.” As party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Libya is obliged under Article 19 to ensure the right to “seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, inwriting or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice.” Blocking access to web sites that provide content critical of the government is not a legitimate limitation on the right to freedom of expression, Human Rights Watch said.

Source: http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2010/02/03/libya-stop-blocking-independent-web-sites

Cubans turn to illegal Internet access despite risks

AFP, HAVANA

Yoan used to earn US$25 a month working as a computer technician for a state company — and an extra US$500 selling Internet access on Cuba’s vast and varied black market.

The 31-year-old managed 10 accounts for government employees who had authorized e-mail access and would rent out their passwords to trusted clients under certain rules: they could only connect at night or in the early hours, and had to avoid political references.

“I did it because I couldn’t live off my salary,” Yoan said.

But the technician had taken a large risk amid a crackdown by the government of Cuban President Raul Castro as part of an offensive on illegal businesses.

“There was an audit a little while ago, they trawled through the telephone numbers and one customer gave the game away,” Yoan said. “They sacked me and I paid a 1,500 peso [US$60] fine.”

Yoan, who also received a ban from working for four years, was a tiny link in the chain connecting Cubans to the illegal network. An e-mail service costs US$10 to US$15 per month, it costs US$50 per month to navigate the Internet, and US$1 to send or receive an e-mail.

“I need to be in contact with my friends and the world, but I can’t afford ‘underground’ Internet so I only have e-mail. I connect at night because that’s what my illegal provider tells me to do.”

— Aida, a 38-year-old Cuban woman

“I need to be in contact with my friends and the world, but I can’t afford ‘underground’ Internet so I only have e-mail. I connect at night because that’s what my illegal provider tells me to do,” said Aida, a 38-year-old former waitress.

Cuba connects to the Internet by satellite because the decades-long US embargo prevents access to underwater cables that pass near its coastlines.

The government blames the embargo for its limits on the service — it gives priority to state and foreign companies, academics, doctors and research centers.

Dissidents and critics of the government say Cuba, like China, limits Internet access to restrict freedom of information and control criticism of the regime.

They say that is why authorities block dissident sites or blogs, such as the award-winning blog of Yoani Sanchez, for being subversive.

Cubans can connect to e-mail at controlled state access points for US$1.5 per hour or access the Internet in hotels with cards costing US$7 per hour.

But with the average monthly salary at US$20, that is out of reach of most citizens.

“I can’t pay that — that’s why I have illegal e-mail to communicate with my father in Miami,” said Marilis, a 23-year-old law student.

“I’ve never written anything political,” she added indignantly.

Raul Castro allowed computer sales two years ago, but Internet access remains limited.

Barely 1.4 million of the 11.2 million inhabitants have Internet access, and only 630,000 have computers, according to official figures.

Shared access is blamed for slow and patchy connections.

Deputy Computing Minister Ramon Linares said recently that the island’s connection speeds had increased, and an underwater cable was due to start operating from Venezuela in 2011.

That still won’t be enough for Aida.

“Even if they solve the technical problems, we won’t have free access,”  she said. “It’s clear that those who lead the country decide what we can consult.”

Taipei Times – archives (6 February 2010)
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2010/02/07/2003465366

Ore. studies role age plays in child-abuse