What is Will Cole really selling?

The "functional" doctor goes full MAHA

I try to give people the benefit of doubt.

For years, critics of our work at Conspirituality have stated that wellness influencers and naturopaths really believe their products work. And I take people at their word when they say they’ve been helped by this supplement or that protocol. My contention with influencers is predominantly at the population level, where clinical studies happen, not based on anecdotes.

That is: if you’re going to make a broad claim, back it up.

Anecdotes are important in research; they open the door to further investigation. But influencers often weaponize anecdotes, as if they stand in for clinical evidence. For the most part, this is where my criticism of the industry begins and ends.

It’s similar to religion: say you have a deep belief in a god and that helps you get through life, wonderful. Say you have a deep belief in a god and that everyone must also believe in it, we have a different case on our hands. Say your god replaces vaccines, I’m going to call it out.

So I try to give people the benefit of doubt. Even Will Cole. The “functional” practitioner’s star rose due to his association with Goop founder, Gwyneth Paltrow. His doctorate comes from degrees in natural medicine and chiropractic from the Southern California University of Health Sciences, a private nonprofit school that launched as a chiropractic school in 1911 and added wellness-based disciplines over time.

I’m not inherently against any of the fields taught at this college. I’ve noted my own success with chiropractic even while routinely pointing out how often this particular type of doctor brokers in pseudoscience. I’m open to any adjunctive practice being integrated with evidence-based medicine, especially things like yoga and meditation being offered at cancer clinics to help alleviate stress in patients. While I’m more skeptical of claims around acupuncture’s healing powers, I’ve enjoyed a few dozen sessions; they never solved the problem I was told they would, but it was nice lying in a warm room for a half-hour with ambient music playing, which has its own beneficial qualities.

While my eyebrows raise at people like Cole, my ears are open when it comes to integrative medicine, especially given how downright frustrating for-profit healthcare is in America. If additional treatments alleviate the overwhelming burden of disease in some manner, biological or emotional (which can be intertwined), wonderful.

But.

I’ve noticed how Cole plays the crowd. When appearing on Diary of a CEO last year, Cole admitted there’s a place for pharmaceutical intervention, though my brain did (slightly) break when he said functional doctors offer more comprehensive blood tests than evidence-based doctors. Still, he was framing his practice as an addition to modern medicine, not necessarily in opposition to it.

More recently, Cole bashed the “$1 trillion sick care industry,” stating that MAHA is the solution. I’ve noticed that since RFK Jr teamed up with Trump to rebrand as a fear-mongering MAGA rip-off, influencers in Kennedy’s orbit have felt more emboldened to decry the entire medical system.

Case in point: Calley Means, who Cole sometimes co-publishes posts with.

Another criticism I sometimes field is the notion that a range of wellness practitioners exist. Some are great while others are downright grifters. To which I reply: absolutely! I spent enough time in the broader wellness industry to understand the complexities of healing. Like any discipline in life, it’s a spectrum.

But.

The courtesies don’t always cut both ways. Wellness marketing—especially in the age of MAHA—treats evidence-based medicine, and its millions of employees, as if they’re all part of a cabal purely focused on draining your life force and bank account, as if every intervention on offer is only a capitalist exploit.

I’m not being hyperbolic. In the “sick care” video, Cole tells people “committed to misunderstanding” to “skip over this video” while shitting on modern medicine. This flattening is sadly too common. It primes the listener to believe that only practitioners like Cole care, which can only be accomplished by working outside of the “system.”

Then I found this reductive chart on Cole’s site.

I’m not going to go point-by-point over this amateurishly manipulative list, though again, it’s a common wellness marketing tactic. If the “opponent” is painted as purely self-interested and your services as purely beneficial, facts and nuance are irrelevant.

Consider the environment we’re currently in. RFK Jr claims that vaccines, mRNA technology, antidepressants, and mifepristone have not been properly studied, when all four have been endlessly studied (and proven safe and effective, with potential complications, contraindications, and side effects all listed on the product and website). It’s the same blunt force phenomenon as Cole’s reductivism, so it doesn’t surprise me that he champions MAHA.

Back to the chart. Here’s a short list of its egregiousness.

• The notion that naturopathic remedies are only safe or inconsequentially dangerous is false. A variety of supplements used in “functional” medicine have resulted in liver damage, kidney damage, anaphylaxis, heart problems, severe bleeding, and neurological damage. A recent report found that six common supplements (including some Cole sells) are linked to increased rates of liver damage. Unlike evidence-based protocols, supplements manufacturers are not required to list contraindications on their products or marketing websites.

• The idea that evidence-based medicine views the body as a “collection of parts” is ridiculous. A variety of disciplines have emerged to treat specific diseases due to the complexity of human biology. Then there’s general practitioners, who assess a patient before sending them to a specialist, if necessary, and emergency medicine practitioners, who have a wide scope of practice—and who all (hopefully) retain the humility to know when their knowledge has reached its limit. Sadly, I rarely see this quality with “functional” doctors. Specialization does not equal bifurcation.

• Evidence-based doctors don’t “mask” symptoms and they certainly try to treat the “root cause.” Yes, pain management is a big part of this discipline, operating under the assumption that the alleviation of immediate and even chronic distress could help the patient heal. This doesn’t mean doctors are unconcerned about solving the “root” problem.

• I’ve received a number of messages about how dismissive alt-med practitioners (including “functional” doctors) were to them. Cole’s sweeping statement that his discipline is “participatory” insinuates that evidence-based doctors are only dismissive. Bedside manner matters across disciplines; some practitioners are better than others. People being shamed for turning to pharmaceuticals by (some) alt-med practitioners warrants caution. Meanwhile, I’ve had extremely caring and extremely dismissive doctors. It’s a human thing, not a discipline thing, but it’s obvious why Cole would frame his discipline as altruistic heroes.

• Evidence-based medicine does not rely “almost exclusively on drugs and surgery.” Again, doctor-specific. Loren Fishman is about as evidence-based as they come, yet he recommended that I continue my yoga practice and gave me specific rehabilitation exercises to treat a meniscus tear, which worked wonderfully until a basketball injury made surgery unavoidable. Yes, an anecdote, but don’t swing a big stick if you’re not willing to concede that all doctors don’t immediately turn to drugs or surgery.

• Naturopathy is only evidence-based and not captured by profits? My man. Your entire website is a sales funnel. Your blog is a contrarian marketplace that relentlessly links out to your personal branded supplements and books. You post about topics like autism, which your listed training is not qualified to diagnose or treat, and link to your supplements. Evidence-based practitioners are well aware of pharmaceutical lobby capture. It’s why the Sunshine Act exists, and why anyone with an internet connection can check on whether their practitioner is receiving industry money. Strange that the naturopathic and “functional” worlds have no similar vetting service, no?

The reality of medicine and healing isn’t sexy. Some things work for some people and not others due to multifactorial impacts on health. Some things help some people and cause adverse reactions in others. Some things work for most everybody but not everyone. Some things don’t work very well at all—usually things that haven’t needed the burden of clinical proof.

Those aren’t very marketable messages, which is why evidence-based medicine has ceded ground to the empty promises of charlatans. Bespoke fixes and contrarian remedies are algorithmic currency du jour, and plenty of wellness influencers are here to cash in.

Which is all why I no longer give Will Cole the benefit of the doubt. I take him at his word when he claims to have helped people. But to do so by so flagrantly misrepresenting evidence-based medicine (and potentially turning people away from the help they need), then pretending his discipline transcends danger and financial influence, is so egregious as to present as satire.

The real joke is that he’s serious.