The definitive ranking of the best Hank Green cancer tweets

There are the things I want to write, and then there are the things I am destined to write.

If you haven’t been on the internet, on May 19th, prominent science communicator, YouTuber, TikTokker, and CEO of twelve million companies Hank Green announced he has Hodgkin’s lymphoma. It’s rotten luck, but the good news is that all updates indicate the treatment is going quite well. And we have a lot of updates because Hank has been tweeting pretty much incessantly—which, I realized, created a niche that had to be filled:

Of course it had to be me. See, in high school, I was voted “most likely to cure cancer,” and in college, I was named the Hank Green of our student news blog.1 My entire life has been leading up to this moment. I may not cure cancer, but I will certainly rank the tweets about cancer. In pursuit of my purpose, I have gathered la créme de la créme of the cancer tweets for us all to enjoy and appraise. Unfortunately, they had to be screenshots because for some reason Twitter embeds don’t work on Substack anymore, but I hope we can all handle the jank. Without further ado…

10.

This one made the list for addressing a question I’ve had for a long time, but it’s at the bottom for not having a satisfying answer (though I suppose that’s Hippocrates’ fault).

9.

Some solid2 advice—dehydration is a big issue for people going through chemotherapy. But what gives this tweet the leg up is the foreshadowing for what’s to come.

8.

Here we have a rich tapestry of gratitude, jocosity, trash-talking, and eventual triumph. The lymphoma happened, and that sucks, but lots of smart and hardworking people have put in a lot of time to find ways to treat it—plus its inability to deal with the slightest adversity is an added blessing, helping the chemo thoroughly kick its ass (it seems). There’s even a laugh to be had at its expense. In one tweet we see the hero’s journey; we start with the journey to the unknown, the helper scientists who pioneered effective therapies, the challenges and tribulations of finishing the cancer off for good, and the eventual victory of being able to spit on the name of your enemies. A true monomyth of a tweet.

7.

This one just made me laugh. Next!

6.

More foreshadowing, but this time with an actual scientific explanation for why we’re about to be subjected to a lot of pissing-out-cancer content, which is as good a justification as any! Extra points for the vindication of flushing cancer down the toilet, which is indeed where it belongs.

5.

Moving us into the dated memes3 section of this list, the real treasure here is the Steak-Umms cameo (explained in the alt text, which you’re going to have to go to Twitter.com to see, sorry, blame Elon.) I also like the discreet health update that it seems like Hank is mostly winning, son.

4.

Elton? For pride month? Groundbreaking. But I do enjoy Elton, and I really enjoy the thought of the Rocket Man himself soulfully wailing 🎶 FOLKS ON CHEMO PISS OUT CANCERRRR 🎶. Pandering works, earning this tweet the coveted fourth spot on this list.

3.

A classic Hank Green “excited to learn about the world” tweet, I just really enjoy this one. It’s making lemonade out of lemons, I learned something new about chemo ports, and I’m excited for the upcoming video. Great work all around.

2.

And we’re back to piss. Yes, this is an optimized version of a previous tweet, but we here at No-Brainer Industries support continuous self (and tweet) improvement.4 Added points for how the rest of the thread is how Twitter found out Hank is bi, which resulted in my favorite tweet on the whole godforsaken site.5

1.

A threaded reply? More piss? Indeed, you may be asking, how did this tweet get the top spot? Well, friend, that is because this tweet was sent to the president of the United States.6 

Only on Twitter can you tell the sitting president (or whoever’s running their account) that you are currently pissing out your cancer. This tweet is the culmination of all its predecessors on this list, from helpful science communication to the fascination with cancer excretion to the utter meme of making sure the president knows that folks on chemo piss out cancer. No, not only is this the culmination of one man’s journey, this is the culmination of the internet’s journey. They will study this thread in schools one day. This will be a question on an APUSH exam asking about how the intersection of biology, social media, and the US Government made this possible. There was no other contender. This is the apotheosis of Hank Green cancer tweets. My work here is done.