This week’s Longreads Member pick is “The American Nonconformist in the Age of the Commercialization of Dissent,” a 1992 essay by Thomas Frank from The Baffler, the magazine he cofounded with Keith White in 1988. Frank writes: “In republishing this bit of juvenilia from 1992—my very first exploration of an idea that I reworked and reconsidered […]
The Baffler
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A critical look at the political newspaper and website Politico: One classic method of unleashing irresistible Drudge bait on the Internet is to boil another outlet’s story down to a couple salacious-sounding excerpts, or (failing an effective condensing strategy) to simply reinterpret the material to fit a Drudge-friendly narrative. This past May, for example, Vanity […]
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Why the sudden proliferation of “vibrant” communities in the United States? And what does it even mean? Is Rockford, Illinois, vibrant? Oh my god yes: according to a local news outlet, the city’s ‘Mayor’s Arts Award nominees make Rockford vibrant.’ The Quad Cities? Check: As their tourism website explains, the four hamlets are ‘a vibrant […]