California prosecutors have charged two anti-abortion activists who made undercover videos of themselves trying to buy fetal tissue from Planned Parenthood with 15 felonies, saying they invaded the privacy of medical providers by filming without consent.
State attorney general Xavier Becerra announced the charges on Tuesday against David Daleiden of Davis, California, and Sandra Merritt of San Jose. The two operate the Irvine-based Center for Medical Progress.
The allegations say the pair filmed 14 people without permission between October 2013 and July 2015 in Los Angeles, San Francisco and El Dorado counties. One felony count was filed for each person. The 15th was for criminal conspiracy to invade privacy.
Becerra says they used a fictitious bioresearch company to meet with women’s healthcare providers and covertly record them.
Daleiden, in an email to the Associated Press, said the “bogus” charges were coming from “Planned Parenthood’s political cronies”.
“The public knows the real criminals are Planned Parenthood and their business partners,” Daleiden said.
Planned Parenthood – which has previously said the videos were “heavily edited to deceive the public” – welcomed the charges, saying they sent “a clear message: you can’t target women and healthcare providers without consequences”.
Planned Parenthood (@PPact)
CA Attorney General filing criminal charges sends a clear message — you can’t target women & health care providers without consequences. https://t.co/dFT42uZUyq
March 29, 2017
In April of last year, Daleiden said in a Facebook post that California department of justice agents had raided his home, seizing all of his video footage along with personal information.
Since then, the case had gone largely quiet, with virtually no revelations about the investigation and no indication that the charges were coming before they were filed on Tuesday in San Francisco superior court.
The prosecution got a new leader this year in Becerra, a longtime Congressional Democrat, who took over for Kamala Harris when she became a US senator.
Daleiden and Merritt had previously been indicted in Texas on similar charges in January 2016, but all of the charges were eventually dropped by July as prosecutors said a grand jury had overstepped its authority. The grand jury had originally been convened to investigate Planned Parenthood, but after finding no wrongdoing indicted Daleiden and Merritt instead.
Late last year an American child, not yet a teenager, killed herself. A video has surfaced online which purportedly shows the girl recording herself via life stream video doing it.
I came across the video via Facebook. Someone alerted me to it less than a week after her death. I did what any reasonable person would do: I followed Facebook’s own advice and reported it for showing graphic details of self-harm or suicide.
Less than two hours later I received a reply. It wasn’t what I expected:
We’ve reviewed the share you reported for showing someone injuring themselves and found that it doesn’t violate our Community Standards.
In subsequent communications, Facebook also claimed that because it is not hosting the video, it is not responsible. This is despite the fact that due to its inaction the links were widely available on Facebook for anyone to see long after I reported the problem. It has not been verified that the video is authentic but whether it is or it isn’t, the content of the video shows a child committing the most serious act of self harm and is not appropriate for public viewing.
After nearly 20 years working with suicidal people I have a particular view on whether this is something that people should be watching:we should not. What community would find this acceptable?
Before social media, we used to have a term for videos like this: snuff films.
In New Zealand, we have very clear laws around the reporting of suicide. You can’t even report that a death is a suicide without permission from the chief coroner. And even then, talking about how the person did it, or what happened is out. There’s a good reason for this.
Research shows that when suicides are reported in detail, including how the person did it, there is a sharp rise in “copycat” suicides. Vulnerable people are triggered and influenced by the gratuitous details of suicide stories. In fact, if you feel suicidal it’s not uncommon to feel compelled to watch such a video. And in doing so, drive yourself even closer to the edge.
Despite what many might think, suicidal people are not going to be “talked out of” their situation by the reality of how painful, or messy the death they choose for themselves might be. You don’t shock people out of such state; you care them out of it.
Facebook has recently made a big deal of being sensitive to, and aware of, mental health issues and the impact of graphic videos about self-harm and suicide. They even have a “Compassion Team”.
But is it compassionate to allow the sharing of a snuff video of a child’s death? If a distressed child stumbles across the video on Facebook and takes their own life, is Facebook liable?
Facebook claims to have taken the video down but it still appears on other pages. Whatever systems Facebook has in place aren’t working. They claim people need to report each and every instance of the video being shared in order for it to be taken down – but couldn’t it use its extensive resources more effectively than that? That’s why I have set up a petition with suicide prevention ambassador Mike King to call on Facebook to make the required changes urgently.
Perhaps the last word should go to her family, the people who loved her and have watched this unfold. They posted their own request, on Facebook of course, begging people to share their tribute rather than the video:
I get the fact that people want to spread awareness about depression and I stand up for that 100% because I know how real it is, but spreading a video showing a … girl do the absolute unthinkable is not the way to do it. Please remember that we (her family) already have to live with it and having that video pop up every time we turn around is NOT what we need right now.
For those who have showed our family nothing but compassion, I would like to say THANK YOU. It is a very difficult time for us all and your support is greatly appreciated.
May you finally rest in peace.
I assume they’re not thanking Facebook for their compassion.
So it’s up to all of us. If you think you’re helping by sharing this video, you’re not. So please if you have shared it, delete your post. And if you see a link to this video in your feed report it to Facebook.
Facebook has failed us. But we don’t have to fail each other.
In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14. In the UK, the Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. In New Zealand, you can contact Lifeline on 0800 543 354.
Kyle MacDonald is a New Zealand based psychotherapist.
The government says that it is funding training to help GPs’ receptionists to be more sensitive to patients’ needs. Receptionists must decide which patients are a priority, as pressure on them increases by the day, and their allegedly brusque demands for symptom details are hurtful.
Perhaps these receptionists will be sent to a special school where they will study old videos of Les Dawson doing his strange drag act as the woman who can’t quite bring herself to say indelicate things. Her voice dies out to silence halfway through the sentence, while the rubbery lips continue to mouth the words. So the Les Dawson-trained receptionist will say: “So sir, you’ve got a problem [inaudible whisper, lips moving emphatically] downstairs in the front-bottom waterworks department?”
Of course, this is no good if you’re talking to the patient on the phone. The person who actually needs this sensitivity training is my wife, who, when I plaintively inform her I have flu-like symptoms, gasps something like: “Influenza? Like the Spanish flu of 1918 that killed 50 million people? Oh, my God, we have to inform the council and the army and seal off the house.”
Uneasy elevations
Lady Chakrabarti is coming in for criticism on the subject of schools. But that isn’t exactly why her recent elevation makes me uneasy. I wonder if Jeremy Corbyn ever says that his other shadow cabinet ministers bring him problems, but Shami Chakrabarti brings him solutions? That is how Margaret Thatcher used to describe David Young, the dynamic chairman of the Manpower Services Commission. In 1984 she made him a life peer, and as Lord Young of Graffham he was elevated into cabinet, first as minister without portfolio, then secretary of state for employment and then for trade and industry. He had a very substantial government career, without ever having to suffer the indignity of pinning on a rosette or ringing on doorbells, or kissing babies – the ordeal, in short, of having to persuade the tiresome public to vote for him. He was a loyal Thatcherite partisan who made cabinet colleagues restless, particularly Norman Tebbit, because he never earned his spurs at the ballot box. Now, like others who have followed his trajectory, Chakrabarti has the chance to wield power, swathed in ermine. Mightn’t it be better for her to renounce her title, like Tony Benn, and fight an election?
Bush whacking
One the creepiest aspects of Donald Trump’s “locker room” tape was the 15 microseconds of fame it conferred on Billy Bush, cousin of George W Bush Jr, the talkshow host who was heard submissively and supportively giggling along to Donald’s sexual assault brags. Poor, pathetic Billy Bush, who loses his job, gets the odium, but doesn’t get to participate in Donald’s satanic celebrity status. One of the great undiscussed things about this kind of pathology is how the bully always needs a beta male, a lower-ranking wingman and yes man to validate the groping and the harassment.
Billy Bush and Donald Trump, the world’s least charming double act, were predicted in Neil LaBute’s icily prescient1997 movie, In the Company of Men. Howard, played by Matt Malloy, is a nerdy office worker who has no success with women. He falls under the spell of macho alpha dog Chad, played by Aaron Eckhart, who is similarly unable to get dates. Chad gigglingly persuades Howard to join him in a misogynist revenge plan to break the heart of a hearing-impaired woman who works in their office. It starts as a nasty joke and becomes a nasty reality. Watch the movie, and you can imagine the relationship of Billy and Donald.
We’ve all had viral cat videos find their way onto our Facebook and Twitter feeds. We’ll click, watch and continue with our day with a smile. But not all viral videos are cute, or uplifting. Lately, another kind of video is making the rounds. Instead of cute roly-poly pandas frolicking among bamboo shoots, they feature something very different: humans overdosing on heroin.
The viral images are truly shocking, showing overdose victims – often in the presence of little children – unconscious and near death. One featured a couple in East Liverpool, Ohio, who were passed out in their car. Their four-year-old boy sat in his carseat behind them. Another involved the mother of a two-year-old, who overdosed in front of her child at a Family Dollar store in Lawrence, Massachusetts. The latest shows an unconscious couple splayed in strange positions on a Memphis street – thankfully, without kids this time.
Police and others argue that posting these photos and videos will deter drug use. The East Liverpool police said on Facebook: “We feel it necessary to show the other side of this horrible drug. We feel we need to be a voice for the children caught up in this horrible mess.” The argument is that if more people knew what overdose really looks like, the epidemic of deaths would end.
Research, unfortunately, shows exactly the opposite. Studies find that the more coverage focuses on the ravages of addiction, the less likely the public is to support effective policies that favor treatment over punishment. These images also have a counterproductive effect on people with addiction themselves: they increase shame, which is associated with relapse, not recovery.
Many still think otherwise, though. It seems like a self-evident truth that no one would willingly choose to wind up in such a situation. And so, the thinking goes, if we can only show people how bad it really is to take drugs, that no one will ever misuse them.
Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of addictions begin during teenage years – a time in which the brain responds to risk in a quite different way than the adult brain does. While some data suggests that scare tactics work to stop adults from engaging in risky behavior, they do not work for teens. They may even backfire by making youth more curious about drugs.
And once people are addicted, fear and shame don’t work either. The data shows that treatments that involve confronting and humiliating people with addiction backfire. Greater confrontation is associated with increased alcohol and other drug use in four decades worth of studies reviewed here. Showing people videos of their own intoxicated behavior fails to prevent relapse – it actually increases use. Research finds that the more shame people with addiction feel, the less likely they are to recover.
But perhaps the most insidious effects of these videos is on the general public. Studies show that images and stories of active addiction, without information about recovery, cut support for help, like expanding drug treatment.
The problem faced by people with addiction is not that they are unaware of the negative consequences of their condition, but that they can’t see a way out. If we want to end the opioid crisis, we need viral videos of recovery, not overdose.
YouTube has become the go-to social platform for life hacks. Hoards of chipper lifestyle vloggers upload new self-improvement videos every day, ranging from recipes for hot chocolate served in an orange to the secrets to effective to-do list writing. But among the homemaking tips and makeup tutorials, a crop of these videos are tackling a more serious subject: mental health.
Prominent figures like Zoe “Zoella” Sugg, who has a YouTube following of 10 million, is among the dozens of celebrity vloggers to have uploaded personal stories and tips for overcoming anxiety to the Google-owned video platform.
At a time when access to mental health treatment is under increasing strain and stigmas still abound, could YouTube videos about anxiety be a viable means of treatment for sufferers?
“Watching videos about people talking [about] their anxiety on YouTube is a net positive,” mental health advocate and anxiety sufferer Ashley Womble said. “It can make people feel less alone and encourage them to take action to deal with their mental health issue.”
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Womble, who runs mental health support website Psyched, said that one of the biggest benefits of these videos is removing the stigma of talking about living with mental health issues.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, anxiety is the most common mental illness in the US, affecting 40 million adults. It’s an umbrella term for a number of mental health disorders, including generalized anxiety disorder, panic attacks, obsessive-compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. These are characterized by persistent and unrealistic worry about everyday things. Treatment typically involves talk therapy, such as psychotherapy or cognitive behavioral therapy, and more severe cases can be treated with medication.
Brian Primack, professor of medicine at the University of Pittsburgh, also agrees that YouTube videos about anxiety are a big step towards talking about mental health. Primack, who specializes in the effect of social media on mental health, adds that the impact of these videos is strengthened when they’re made by prominent YouTube personalities with large fanbases.
“Instead of a stuffy doctor giving you jargon and terminology that’s complicated, the information is coming from a peer,” he said.
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After the success of Sugg’s videos, the UK mental health charity Mind appointed her a digital ambassador in 2014 and worked in partnership with YouTube and Sugg to launch a social media campaign around anxiety and panic attacks. Recognizing the potential therapeutic and awareness benefits of these videos, the charity also hosts a YouTube series of its own, called #mentalhealthseries, in which it encourages viewers to upload a video of themselves sharing their personal stories.
The charity vets the videos before uploading them to its channel of over 6,000 subscribers and links to Mind resources for further information and support for viewers.
Eve Critchley, Mind’s head of digital, says social media can help anxiety suffers feel less isolated. “Increasingly social media is giving young people a way of voicing their experiences,” Critchley said. “Mind actively encourages people to create their own ‘mental health selfies’ because sometimes the best mental health advice we get is not from professionals, but from people who’ve been through the same thing as us.”
The National Institute of Mental Health estimates that more than half of US counties have no mental health professionals. For most Americans, therapy is limited to what their insurance covers, which often isn’t a whole lot and many patients report the process of finding a therapist through their plan a frustrating – and even discriminating – process.
The American Psychological Association estimates that 30% of therapists don’t take insurance at all, and in some states, like California, that figure is closer to 50%.
“In those situations where there really is no other information, I think there are a lot of benefits to getting it in other ways,” Primack said.
However, Womble cautions that no matter how good the information might be, videos will never be a substitute for therapy.
“One of the things that’s a little [disconcerting] is that many of these videos don’t suggest talking to a mental health professional or thinking about any types of therapy, even a support group,” she said.
Womble also stresses that for a true anxiety disorder, some form of professional therapy is a requirement. She points to online resources such as TalkSpace, InYourCorner and Joyable as affordable and accessible remote treatment options for sufferers.
Womble adds that many of the videos on YouTube do not make a clear enough distinction between anxiety as a mental health disorder and anxious feelings that are normal for everyone. Referring to the videos that are tip-based, she says they are more like stress management techniques than something that addresses anxiety disorder.
“It’s fine to talk about your feelings of anxiety but that’s very different to having anxiety disorder,” Womble said. “It could be a little off-putting for people with serious mental health issues to see people talking about chewing gum and drinking tea as ways of dealing with anxiety.”
Individuals will be encouraged to ask to be turned in their beds when they are unpleasant. Photograph: Alamy
Hospitals are to be encouraged to give airline security-type movies to individuals before they are admitted for remedy in an energy to cut down on avoidable suffering from bed sores, lack of hygiene and failure to take medicine.
Patients will be recommended on troubles such as taking medication in accordance to prescriptions and suitable hygiene measures, and encouraged to examine whether personnel have washed their hands.
They will also be urged to ask regardless of whether they can be turned in their beds when they truly feel unpleasant, below a new security campaign developed to change the culture inside of parts of the NHS.
Jeremy Hunt, the well being secretary, has published data on every single hospital in the nation, rating their security on 7 counts like inspection specifications, staffing levels and infection management. It is portion of a campaign to inspire a lot more openness and transparency in the NHS in the wake of the Mid Staffordshire scandal.
A evaluation of whistleblowing procedures has also been confirmed. Hunt presented figures suggesting that 29 of the 141 acute trusts in England are not open and truthful about their security performance and 87 are just “Okay”.
Hunt said there are twelve,000 avoidable deaths in the NHS every single 12 months and this have to be minimize by half inside of three many years. Unsafe care is triggering “immeasurable” harm to sufferers and families and costing hospitals millions of pounds in litigation and in placing issues correct.
Sir David Dalton, chief executive of Salford Royal Hospital Foundation Believe in, who is foremost the transparency campaign, explained the NHS should learn from airlines who have to demonstrate a safety video prior to every takeoff.
“Airlines do this on every single single event to engage their passengers in what they think to be really important.”
The trust running Guy’s and St Thomas’s hospitals in London is currently creating such a video. Other people will be anticipated to comply with suit.
Sir Robert Francis, the lawyer who led the official inquiry into the disastrous care at Mid Staffs, is to perform an independent review into the treatment of whistleblowers inside of the NHS. It is due to report in November.
He warned that every single time workers heard a whistleblower say they had been handled badly, other people would be deterred from speaking up. “I consider this demands to be modified fairly rapidly,” he explained. “We require a culture in which ‘I want to report this’ is the imagined foremost in the mind of any NHS worker who has issues – a culture the place concerns are listened to and acted upon.”
Mid Staffs had shown the “appalling consequences for sufferers in which there is a ‘closed ranks’ culture”, mentioned Francis.
Hunt said the NHS had come a prolonged way since Mid Staffs but there have been nevertheless also numerous cases exactly where staff concerns have been ignored. New measures would tackle this head on, he mentioned.
