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TAKE IT UP A NOTCH

2023-08-08 · letter vlog · John · 4:47 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Nerdfighteria (also: Personal life, Philosophy & meaning, Health) · mode: Personal essay · tags: community lore, civic or action cta, heavy topic

John replays his January goal to take it down a notch and lists how 2023 instead took it up a notch (Hank's cancer, his temporary CEO jobs, a fight with drug companies); he argues we do not control our fate and that blaming people for their illness breeds stigma, then asks viewers to vote in a poll on whether to keep the four-minute rule.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — John's January goal to take it down a notch, and the year's notch-raising events

  • ★★ John replays a clip of his January 2023 video in which he said his only goal for the year was to take it down a notch. (playful) — 00:00:00 · John Green

  • ★★★ Mocking his past self as a sweet newborn, John says that, as the real world shows, you do not get to decide the notch situation. (playful) — 00:00:00

    “You do not get to decide the notch situation.”

  • ★★★ John lists what took 2023 up a notch: Hank got cancer and had to have chemotherapy and radiation. (playful) — 00:00:00 · Hank Green, cancer

  • ★★ John says he was unexpectedly promoted to reluctant and temporary CEO of two companies with 115 employees in total. (playful) — 00:00:29
  • ★ John jokes that Hank also kept coming up with millions of business ideas, taking it up another notch. (playful) — 00:00:29 · Hank Green
  • ★★ John says he had a somewhat dramatic confrontation with one, possibly two, of the world's largest drug companies over a tuberculosis drug's price, if the second keeps price gouging the poorest countries. (playful) — 00:00:29 · tuberculosis

00:00:58 — The notch rises like a balloon; a bubble on the tide of empire; control as a helpful delusion

  • ★★ John compares the notch to a helium balloon slipping away sometime in February and rising; it will probably descend at some point, but not for him to know when. (playful, hedged) — 00:00:58
  • ★★★ John tells his past self that, as Robert Penn Warren put it, he is a bubble on the tide of empire. — 00:00:58
  • ★★★ John says imagining more control over our fate than we have can be a helpful delusion: feeling powerless as on a plane he could not function, and he does have a little agency; his choices matter. — 00:01:27
  • ★★★ John says the great risk of imagining he decides his notch situation is extrapolating that others decide theirs, which can lead to stigma and dehumanization. — 00:01:27

00:01:56 — Imagining others decide their notch leads to stigma: comments blaming Hank's cancer

  • ★★ John says they have both seen comments blaming Hank's cancer on a vaccination, on working too hard, or on his ulcerative colitis. — 00:01:56 · Hank Green, vaccine, cancer
  • ★★★ John says such comments are designed to make the commenter feel safe from cancer; hunting for the cause when you are not Hank's physician is about wanting to feel better yourself, not about Hank. — 00:01:56
  • ★★ John stresses that such comments have been very rare for Hank and that almost everyone has been extraordinarily supportive. — 00:02:26 · Hank Green
  • ★★★ John says Hank's experience is not typical: with HIV, cancer, tuberculosis or another highly stigmatized disease, the social response is part of what makes the illness so difficult. — 00:02:26 · cancer, tuberculosis

00:02:55 — The four-minute rule, its suspension since Hank's diagnosis, a poll on keeping it; feeling accompanied helps; sign-off

  • ★★ John says the original point was that you don't decide the notch situation, but if a chance to take it down a notch emerges, he wants to take it. — 00:02:55
  • ★★ John explains that since 2007, with a few exceptions, their videos must be under four minutes, a rule to force concision and intentional use of people's attention. — 00:02:55 · Four-minute rule
  • ★★ John likes the four-minute rule: it helped him become a better writer, and without it The Fault in Our Stars would have been about a hundred pages longer and not as good. — 00:02:55 · Four-minute rule, The Fault in Our Stars
  • ★★ John says getting a video idea under four minutes is often a lot of work, citing the old line about writing a shorter letter if one had more time. — 00:03:42
  • ★★★ John says that since Hank's diagnosis they have suspended the four-minute rule for more flexibility, which he kind of loves; this video will run over four minutes. — 00:03:42 · Four-minute rule, Hank Green
  • ★★ John is a little conflicted: he understands the rule is important and long-standing, and one reason they have been able to make things for so many people for so long. — 00:03:42 · Four-minute rule
  • ★★★ John asks viewers to decide, via a poll linked in the description, whether the brothers should continue the four-minute rule. — 00:04:11 · Four-minute rule, doobly-doo, Nerdfighteria
  • ★★★ John says from experience that feeling accompanied and unalone as the notches go up helps, if less than the notches coming down, and thanks viewers for being with them. — 00:04:11 · Nerdfighteria

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: cancer · Four-minute rule · social stigma

Also: doobly-doo · HIV/AIDS · Robert Penn Warren · The Fault in Our Stars · tuberculosis · ulcerative colitis (concept) · vaccine · victim blaming

Also centred on social stigma: 'end the stigma' · My Physicalmental Illness · Talking Tuberculosis, GeneXpert, J&J, and more with MY HEROES · Why Can't I Take My Meds? · I've Been Pooping All Wrong

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