Context

Ancient Modern Medicine

What is the origin of health? In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the focus is not on treating illness but on creating the conditions for health. This is an important difference and why it is often referred to as preventative medicine. The goal is to bring greater vitality and restore one to a natural state of health. Although Chinese physicians were able to treat acute conditions and even epidemic diseases, the best physicians rarely treated sick people because they were able to discover and treat subtle imbalances before illness developed.

Chinese medicine is a tradition that dates back at least 2,500 years in the historical record and likely extends back to at least 4,000 years ago. Some texts mention acupuncture and herbs as early as 550 BCE. The development of the Yin-Yang theory, the Five Elements, and pulse diagnostics, all began to be expressed and recorded in writing in the Warring States Period (475-221 BCE). The book Huang Di’s Internal Classic was written down in those times and continues to be the basis of much of what we practice today. (Chinese Acupuncture and Moxibustion, pp. 1-3)

To me, this is indigenous medicine: it is always practiced with the seasons, temperature, and surrounding environs in mind; it is individualized to the person’s precise needs at the precise time, and it is based on supporting the body to realign with Nature’s innate balance. What is somewhat unique about it is that it was written down. Since the Chinese were never colonized, their libraries never burned or their languages completely lost, these records still exist today. This is an incredible jewel. Some of the ancient ways of thinking and healing, which continue to be extremely effective, have been preserved in these ancient texts for millennia. I imagine that many cultures shared many of these same insights and knowledge and yet so much has been lost. This is due to thousands of years of colonialism, slavery, genocide and religious intolerance and the ongoing destruction of much of the most sacred and healthful traditions that human beings have practiced. What I find truly heartening, is that some of these original understandings that people had of their relationship with the Earth and ways of healing are preserved in Chinese medicine. These ways are powerful technologies of healing and modern people of all backgrounds can receive help from these indigenous Chinese healing arts. I hope that receiving this kind of care can rekindle memories of each of our unique indigenous healing ways.

Acupuncture as Revolutionary Medicine

Video courtesy of Eana Meng: ofpartandparcel.com

Acupuncture began in the US as a revolutionary act. Some Chinese and Chinese-Americans were practicing in the US as early as the 1800s but though they were able to treat people this was technically illegal. Acupuncture did not reach the mainstream until Henry Kissinger’s first trip to Communist China in 1971. James Reston, a journalist with the New York Times, had to get an emergency appendectomy while on this trip, and instead of opioids for his post-operation pain, he received acupuncture and moxibustion which he later wrote about in the New York Times. This is nearly always cited as the route that acupuncture took to becoming well-known in the US, but the reality is that members of the Black Panther Party and other Black Liberation activists began using it starting in 1970 at Lincoln Hospital in New York. In this era, there was another opioid epidemic, which was heroin flooding the streets of Harlem which was treated in hospitals with methadone treatment. Of course, methadone is just a prescription opiate instead and did not help people kick the addiction. Acupuncture filled a role as a holistic route of detox that activists from the Black Panther Party and The Puerto Rican Young Lords brought to their people in New York through the Lincoln Detox Center. “Dr. Mutulu Shakur, stepfather of the late Tupac Shakur, along with members of the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords, combined community health with radical politics to create the first acupuncture detoxification program in America” (https://dopeisdeath.com). They took over Lincoln hospital and created a holistic detox center. They gave ear acupuncture to thousands of people for about 8 years, until it was forcibly shut down by 200 armed police. State officials claimed that the Lincoln Detox Center was “badly mismanaged and that program leaders had threatened reprisals if there was any attempt to oust them” (ofpartandparcel.com). Dr. Mutulu Shakur was arrested for armed robbery and has been in jail since 1986. He is still incarcerated and now fighting bone cancer, and yet has been denied parole multiple times. Please check out the updates from his family and friends at https://mutulushakur.com.

In today’s opioid epidemic, Acupuncture is still an inexpensive, natural way to help people to drop addictions. There is often a perception of Acupuncture in the US as a healthcare option for the elite but organizations like POCA, Acupuncturists Without Borders, and other community clinics continue the work of keeping acupuncture as a medicine of the people.

At our clinic, we have a sliding scale price to make our services available to people at all levels of economic access. As a business we make monthly contributions to the Nisenan people whose land we occupy. We also make a quarterly gift donation to organizations that support holistic health for people in communities that have been historically disenfranchised. Please donate to one of them day and also know that a percentage of sales will go to these causes.

https://www.nisenan.org https://chapa-de.org

https://mutulushakur.com http://www.healingcliniccollective.net/donate.html

https://www.blackwomenbirthingjustice.com. https://www.maternidadlaluz.com