In perhaps the most memorable scene in the 1997 classic film Goodwill Hunting, a brilliant

working-class janitor, played by Matt Damon, breaks down when told simply by his therapist, it's not your fault.

Look at me son.

It's not your fault.

I know.

It's not your fault I know no no it's not

your fault I know no no it's not your fault.

I think about that scene a lot these days and not just because we're living through a period of 90s nostalgia.

I think about it because it exemplifies what I believe is happening on an emotional level to people who are connecting with the Bernie Sanders campaign.

You see Bernie articulates more clearly than any other candidate that the problems facing

everyday Americans are not the result of laziness or a failure to work hard. It's because systems have been rigged

to benefit the rich at our expense. Republicans and moderate Democrats for years

have mythologized to the quote unquote undeserving poor,

cast working people as takers as opposed to makers,

and pretended that good outcomes were proof of merit

and that poor outcomes were deserved.

In psychology this is called the Just World fallacy.

The idea that good things happen to good people and bad things are desert.

It helps us to feel that the world isn't so random and cruel.

But it also helps disguise structural issues

that are at the root of so many problems

that feel random, but aren't really.

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