An invitation to readers, listeners and viewers…
Announcing... The Mark Steyn Club!

It's no secret that the last few years have been some of the most challenging of my life. I'm about to begin my sixth year in the hell of the DC court system over a 270-word blog post about the most influential and damaging scientific graph of the 21st century. It is the most consequential American free-speech case in half-a-century, which is why my side has attracted the support of such unlikely allies as the ACLU and The Washington Post. It has, however, been procedurally bollocksed by an incompetent DC judge, so it will be a few years yet, and seems likely (alas) to wind up at the Supreme Court. So I'll need considerable resources to stay in the game for most of the coming decade.

My new TV show was intended to keep me sufficiently liquid for that. But that didn't exactly work out as planned, and in fact has now resulted in another protracted, ruinously expensive round of legal hell. But I'm still here, and I've been buoyed by the many kind notes from those who enjoyed aspects of the show and suggested what elements might be retained in the months ahead.

One aspect of the CRTV model I was never comfortable with was the subscription-only aspect. It was never meant to be part of the plan for The Mark Steyn Show. Indeed, the honcho who pitched it to me said that "Mark needs to be on TV at this critical time in history." It's a weird thing to be told that you need to be out there saving western civilization - but only for premium subscribers. Anybody in the ideas business wants their ideas out in the world, available to all and tested by all.

I felt that particularly strongly after taking part in last year's Munk Debate before an audience of upscale leftie Torontonians on the subject of the "refugee" crisis afflicting the western world. I walked on stage at Roy Thomson Hall with my debating partner Nigel Farage (a few weeks before his Brexit triumph) to find the pre-show survey had almost 80 per cent of the crowd opposed to us. By the end of the night, Nigel and I had, by one of the biggest margins in Munk Debate history, persuaded a significant percentage of the audience to change its opinion - simply by stating the reality of the situation in a compelling and persuasive manner. That's the key word: persuasion. And you can't persuade people over to your side if you're holed up behind a subscription paywall talking to people who already agree with you.

So I'm not interested in walling up our content and limiting its reach.

That's by way of explaining what The Mark Steyn Club isn't. The content at SteynOnline will still be free and available to all. What we're trying to do is find a way to keep it going at the highest-quality level. Many of you, for example, have said how much you enjoy the full-length interviews with those out on the front lines of the free-speech wars, like Professor Jordan Peterson, or doing the hard work getting in the heads of A-list jihadists, as Dr James E Mitchell did, or tracing the history of the Forgotten Man, from the 19th century to the 2016 election, as Amity Shlaes outlined for us recently. In-depth interviews can't be done on Skype, because that's kind of hard to watch for a full hour: It requires you and the guest being in the same place, professionally lit and shot, etc. So that's a major commitment, but one worth doing and one we intend to keep going. Likewise, my live appearances - like the recent Ottawa and Phoenix events - reach a far greater audience than those in the theatre if they can be filmed and distributed. (And we hope to place some of this content on a real TV station, too.)

So I'd like to invite longtime supporters of SteynOnline to become a Founding Member of our new Mark Steyn Club. Founder Membership isn't for everyone, but it does ensure that all our content will be for everyone, and out there in the world - from my essay on Allan Bloom's Closing of the American Mind to the Christopher Caldwell interview on Europe's Islamization, from my columns on the latest terrorist attack to my SteynPost on the epidemic of "death by despair" ...and on a cheerier note our celebrations of Buster Keaton, my compatriot Ruth Lowe and other cultural figures. Founding Members of the new Steyn Club will help to support this content.

Founder Membership is for a limited number and a limited time only. And it does come with benefits:

~To welcome you to the club, a free personally autographed book or CD
~Exclusive Steyn Store member pricing
~The chance to engage in live Q&A sessions with yours truly
~An exclusive new feature: Tales For Our Time
~Transcript and audio versions of our video content
~Comment Club membership
~My new quarterly newsletter/magazine
~Advance booking for my live appearances around the world
~Customized email alerts for new content in your areas of interest (arts, politics, culture, or the whole shebang)

To become a Founding Member of The Mark Steyn Club, or to sign up a friend, please click here.

Please note that all subscribers to our Se'nnight of Steyn weekly digest automatically become Basic Members, at no charge. It doesn't confer the benefits above, and you can be dragged from your seat and up the aisle by airline security at any moment, but you do get to enjoy special member pricing on books and CDs, etc. But, if you're a Se'nnight subscriber and you'd like to upgrade, you're also welcome to click here.