It was the "exorcism" that got me.
That was the moment my chin hit my chest watching Netflix's The Goop Lab — a six-part series about the cult wellness brand that's so woo-woo and batshit, it's genuinely quite entertaining. That was the moment I allowed myself to utter the words aloud, "What in the living fuck?"
"I had an exorcism," Elise Loehnen, chief content officer at Goop, told CEO and founder Gwyneth Paltrow in a shiny, pastel room in Santa Monica. Loehnen did not have an exorcism, just to be clear. The Goop staff had been trying out "energy healing," which involved Goop employees lying on massage tables while a man stood over them making puppeteer motions as they moved, jerked, and contorted their bodies.
"The technology isn't quite there yet to measure energy healing," an energy healing consultant tells Paltrow in her office. "Just because something isn't proven doesn't mean it doesn't work."
But many scientists are skeptical.
You might already be familiar with Goop, Paltrow's controversial and heavily criticised lifestyle empire. Goop's fiercest critic, OB/GYN Dr. Jen Gunter, recently told Mashable she thinks Paltrow is "the chief content officer for misinformation." The brand is best known for selling vaginal jade eggs (a very bad idea), for claiming that bras cause cancer (something that's been debunked many times by medical experts), and for advocating vaginal steaming (do not do this). The words "pseudoscience" and "snake oil" are frequently used in connection with the brand.
Watching The Goop Lab will not allay any fears you might have about Goop's power to disseminate harmful myths about health. What it does do is offer a fascinating glimpse into the minds of the people behind this scientifically dubious operation. Each of the six 30-minute episodes delves into a different wellness topic including psychedelics therapy, cold therapy, psychics, female pleasure, energy healing, and anti-ageing.
As you progress through each episode, you witness Goop staff experimenting with magic mushrooms, jumping into freezing cold lakes, and talking to a psychic. You see Paltrow trying a "vampire facial,"a treatment which involves getting her own plasma injected into her face. Do not try this at home, folks.
One phrase you'll hear a few times: "We have a lot of anecdotal evidence..."
One phrase you'll hear a few times throughout the series is: "We have a lot of anecdotal evidence...." which you can make up your own mind about. You'll also notice a decent peppering of infomercial-like pieces to camera featuring people claiming that certain experimental therapies changed their lives. I'd skip through those parts, if I were you.
Most surprising and enlightening of all, however, was the episode about female sexuality. It's fascinating that a woman who has attracted a great deal of criticism for selling products for women's vaginas does not, in fact, know the difference between a vulva and vagina. But that was the fact viewers are confronted with in the sexuality episode of The Goop Lab.
Veteran sexologist Betty Dodson gave Paltrow a much-needed anatomy lesson and explained the difference between the vulva and vagina. “The vagina is only the birth canal?" Paltrow asked, hearing the information for the first time. “See, I’m getting an anatomy lesson. I thought the vagina was the whole...." But that wasn't the only thing Paltrow learned in the episode, also being enlightened as to what a "PC" is — cue Dodson, "Your pelvic floor muscle. You’re sitting on it," — and then being horrified to hear about labiaplasty. Maybe someone should tell her about exactly where she's telling people to put the jade eggs...
“We’re very dangerous when we’re knowledgable,” Dodson says to Paltrow near the end of the episode. “Tell me about it,” Paltrow replies with a knowing look. In this case, it’s the lack of knowledge about female anatomy that's dangerous, and honestly, pretty alarming for a brand selling wellness products and treatments.
Watching The Goop Lab, I felt like a day visitor at a cult.
As you progress through this high-gloss, daytime TV-esque series you get a rare glimpse of the inner machinations of the Goop empire. You see how the millennial-pink Goop sausage gets made. The people behind the company's polished façade are warm, personable, but there's also a vulnerability to them. During each Goop Lab experiment, they unpack emotional baggage and trauma. It can be extremely upsetting to watch. In those moments, I wondered if Goop's employees were similar to its consumers: people who are looking for a 'cure' in a place they won't find it. And it's also easy to see the undeniable draw that Goop has. Paltrow is extremely likeable. I found myself wanting to believe her.
Watching The Goop Lab, I felt like a day visitor at a cult. I snapped out of the brainwashing experiment at the exact moment before it was too late to turn back. But Goop fan or skeptic, this show is very watchable. Just make sure you heed the repeated legal disclaimers throughout: "The following series is deigned to entertain and inform — not provide medical advice."
In essence, eagerly consuming The Goop Lab is a bit like eating fast food — you know it's bad for you, but you just can't put it down.
The Goop Lab hits Netflix Jan. 24.
