Welcome to New Western
A new frontier for Western discourse
What is New Western?
New Western (NW) is a network which started in December 2024 as a collaborative effort. At the outset, the core idea was to assemble a consortium — a coed fraternity of sorts — of forward looking writers who seek truth and beauty in the world.
Our first mission was to forge community. We drew up a short list of Substackers — both Poasters (people who publish articles and essays) and Note-ists (people who basically use Substack as Twitter via Notes) — and invited them to the New Western Discord server, which was launched in January. This community of NWers, having grown to more than 60 members, each hand-selected by Peter, Will, and other active NWers, has thrived.
The New Western Substack publication represents the next step in our journey, with the long-term goal of fostering a robust epistemological environment and becoming one of the site’s mainstays.
What is a NWer?
NWers are not journalists nor indoctrinatees; some are dissenting academics, some head up entire firms, some work in politics or tech or entertainment, and several are experienced in the world of fuh-nánce.
The median NWer is intellectually ambitious yet humble, disagreeable yet open-minded. He or she has no shortage of opinions, but is an honest broker of facts, ready and willing to update his or her viewpoints as the evidence permits — even when it may be inconvenient to do so.
Indeed there is a great deal of worldview variance among NWers. Namely, in terms of political leanings, the NW community is almost perfectly equal parts Republican, Democrat, and Libertarian. This variance extends across other — not just political — fault lines: some NWers are devout Christians, others atheistic; some are AI-maximalists while others are less sanguine on the transformative prospects of AI; some believe porn is a scourge on society while others see it as a necessity in keeping sexual predators docile. NWers endeavor to understand both sides of every argument, and value one another’s ideological independence.
Conversely, broad consensus exists within the NW community on a few key items. First and foremost, NWers believe that liberal democracy, despite its flaws, is fundamentally the best political system. Additionally, NWers are highly skeptical of postmodernism (i.e., “Woke”), they unequivocally support free speech, and they dispassionately acknowledge human biodiversity (“dispassionately” meaning not in the r/hbd, “internet racist” kind of way).
Rarely, however, does a NW consensus persist unimpeded by dissent. A core tenet of the NW ethic is embracing substantive debate. On the whole, NWers are delighted at the opportunity to engage in civil discourse and genuinely seek to reason through complex, real-world problems in pursuit of salient insights. They’re unafraid to take positions that are culturally controversial or against the sociopolitical grain. NWers are, in a word, based.1
What to expect from New Western
This publication will feature three distinct content verticals. Subscribers should expect to receive in their inbox:
1. Articles & essays
Written contributions — long form posts — from a rotating roster of NWers. Some NWers already have publications of their own and may cross-post on this publication; some may write solely for New Western. Some may write pseudonymously or even anonymously behind the NW veil — an offering we’re really excited about! No matter the format or source, published content will be 100% human-derived and meet the highest standards of quality.
2. Poll roundups
Hands down, the most active channel within the NW Discord is the Polls channel. This is where NWers create polls, collect responses from the community, and discuss the results. Day in and day out, NWers geek out over interesting polls and we intend to share the most salient ones — along with some commentary — here on this publication.
3. Roundtable discussions
We have also held a number of recorded discussions already and plan to begin posting these here moving forward. The idea is to bring together knowledgable and inquisitive people to discuss the topics of our time in an open and honest dialogue.
How to join the community
First of all… subscribe! (And engage with future posts — especially if you disagree with the contents!)
Aside from being an engaged subscriber, if you are interested in joining the Discord server, please DM either
or .As of right now NW is still a “closed” community as we have found it is best to regulate the guest list rather than the party. We are, however, very interested in beginning to expand the community and would love to hear from y’all. Stay tuned as we will have more on our plans to “open” the community soon.
With that, we would like to leave you with these parting words by Rudyard Kipling in his poem “If” which embodies the collective NW outlook:
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Based
adjective \ ˈbāst \
1. Slang, Internet usage
a. Exhibiting unapologetic authenticity or adherence to convictions, especially in defiance of prevailing social norms or political correctness.
b. Expressing a viewpoint perceived as bold, admirable, or unconcerned with popular opinion.
c. The opposite of “cringe”.
Cool!!!!
Booyah!