Dear
The goop Podcast,
Where is one to begin with
goop? The
vagina candle? I want it.
Charcoal oat waffles topped with spirulina yogurt? Tragic. You, the
podcast? It’s complicated. I started listening in 2018, when you launched with an Oprah interview, as only you would. At the time, podcasts were new to me and
#girlboss somehow still remained my hollow benchmark of personal success and collective feminist progress. Gwyneth Paltrow (or as you affectionately call her, GP) modeled just that, so I tuned in. But it was your other host, the company’s CCO,
Elise Loehnen, that I found myself coming back for week after week. She held spirituality, wellness, and politics in tension and tandem—an exciting amalgamation, and not something I was finding elsewhere. Even now, four years later, it’s rare. I haven’t quit you yet, but in 2020 Loehnen did, and then left the company completely. Recently,
she said on Instagram that “wellness culture can be toxic,” the very reason that my feelings about you remain conflicted. When I remember that
goop is not just a podcast, but a digital magazine and shop that has done some truly inappropriate things—such as
push fasting during a pandemic year when
42 million people in America were food insecure—I’m reminded of the failures of corporate wellness. While one could argue that
goop merely exemplifies the modern struggle between content and commerce, it’s one that leaves me particularly unsettled. That said, I can’t deny the truth: as far as you’re concerned, I keep coming back.
Sincerely,
Erica