Commodify Your Dissent: Salvos from The Baffler
In this thought-provoking collection of essays, editor Thomas Frank and other contributors to  the contrarian journal theBafflerexamine the unprecedented ascendancy of business asthedominating force in American life. If the closest historical parallel is with the Gilded Age and its all-powerful robber barons, Frank and his ilk clearly see themselves as the muckrakers out to expose the  absurdities and abuses of big business. Today, however, advertising has come to permeate every aspect of  our society, and corporations are in the business of manufacturing culture--what Frank calls the  "Culture Trust." These essays analyze the ways in which this Culture Trust has co-opted the  power of dissent by appropriating the language and symbolism of nonconformist youth culture, from hippie  slang to grunge fashion; in other words, when the media markets rebellion, it becomes just another  consumer choice. As evidence, the essayists explore the image of consumer as rebel pioneered by  publications such asDetailsandWired, as well as the preeminence of  "revolutionary" business gurus such as Tom Peters. The result is a highly original book, a  satirical and savage indictment of '90s consumerist culture.