Answer two of the following questions (drawing from “Gaslighting Citizens” and “
Answer two of the following questions (drawing from “Gaslighting Citizens” and “Homeownership and Portfolio Choice Over Generations”), and respond to at least one other student’s post afterward for a total of at least 400 words.
1. How do Beerbohm and Davis apply the personal concept of “gaslighting” to the behaviors and actions of political elites? What are some contemporary examples of this practice the authors find in modern politics, and can you find even more recent examples? Finally, what connections do the authors make between political partisanship and susceptibility to political manipulation?
2. What are “shared audacious beliefs,” and what are some historic examples highlighted by Beerbohm and Davis? According to the authors, what is the “dilemma” between audacious beliefs and gaslighting, and how does this present a problem for active citizenship in a democracy?
3. According to Paz-Pardo, what are the key factors involved in the reduction of homeownership rates between cohorts born in 1940 and 1960, as well as 1960 and 1980? Briefly describe his “life cycle structural model”; how does this model account for the long-term reduction in homeownership across generations?