The fear of playing the fool is a universal psychological phenomenon and an underappreciated driver of human behavior, in the spirit of Malcolm Gladwell's Blink, Dan Ariely's Predictably Irrational, and Susan Cain's Quiet, Fool Proof tracks the implications of the sucker construct from personal choices to cultural conflict, ultimately charting an unexpected and empowering path forward. In the American moral vernacular, we have a whole thesaurus for victims of exploitation. They are suckers born every minute , fools not suffered gladly , dupes, marks, chumps, pawns, and losers. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Cultural stories about suckers abound too- the Trojan Horse, the Boy Who Cried Wolf, the Emperor's New Clothes, even Hansel and Gretel. If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you. Don't go out with him, he only wants one thing. The fear of playing the fool is not just a descriptive fact, it is a prescriptive theme- Don't let that be you. Most of us are constantly navigating two sets of imperatives- how to be successful and how to be good. The fear of being suckered whispers that you can't do both, operating as a quiet caution against leaps of faith and acts of altruism. University of Pennsylvania law professor and moral psychologist Tess Wilkinson-Ryan brings evidence from studies in psychology, sociology.