Gwyneth Steps in Goop Again

Gywneth Paltrow has put her new-age foot in her mouth more than once in recent years while promoting her “modern lifestyle brand,” Goop. Aside from a loooong list of public comments that come off as pure snobbery (she once said, “I would rather die than let my kid eat Cup-a-Soup.”), the actor-turned-entrepreneur has also given a lot of strange and not-medically-founded advice. In the past, Paltrow has suggested that people not only steam-clean their vaginas, but also insert jade eggs into them in the name of good health. This alone may have spawned the hashtag, #wtf.

And now, the world of Goop just got goopier. Dr. Kelly Brogan, who is scheduled to appear as a “trusted expert” at the Goop summit in January, is being scrutinized over past comments she made about HIV/AIDS, as reported by Newsweek.

Brogan, a New York-based private-practice psychiatrist, apparently once compared the idea of HIV causing AIDS to a “meme” — a fleeting cultural concept rather than the established fact that health authorities worldwide consider it. “Drug toxicity associated with AIDS treatment may very well be what accounts for the majority of deaths,” Brogan wrote in a 2014 blog post (which has since been deleted, but can be read here).

When asked about those statements, Brogan told Newsweek that the link between HIV and AIDS was an “assumption” — a strong contradiction to current medical knowledge, of which there is abundant evidence that HIV causes AIDS. She has also made controversial (and many say dangerous) statements in the past about depression, suggesting her own products (including her book) as remedies, rather than conventional medical treatment.

Although Brogan told Newsweek that she has “no formal relationship to Goop,” she is still listed on the upcoming summit’s website, to be featured on a panel of “health-defining doctors, trusted experts, and more of the women (and men) who inspire us every day, together, in conversation—with you.” Goop could not be reached for comment by Newsweek.

All this adds to the company’s already dicey reputation, which Paltrow herself seems to have done the most damage to. Last summer in an interview with Jimmy Kimmel, she appeared to have little idea of what her company sold and confessed that she did not practice many of the strange new-agey routines endorsed by Goop. Paltrow even admitted of her own company: “I don’t know what the fuck we talk about.”