RD Author Salon: Convo with Greg Garrett about his new book "White Lies"

Thank you Nathan Krauss, Honey Badger, Callie🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇲🇽, Kathryn Amos, Laura Stevenson, and many others for tuning into my live video with my good friend and colleague Greg Garrett (Good Trouble newsletter) to talk about his important new book, White Lies: Dismantling Ten Cultural Myths about Race, which will be published by Oxford University Press on July 1. We cover a lot of ground, including reflections on appropriately celebrating our country’s accomplishments and aspirations while telling a truer story about our complicated history and shortcomings.

What I Had to Say About White Lies

“As our nation revisits and revivifies America’s story in 2026, White Lies helps us discern both the truth of our challenging past and the shape of a hopeful future where we might live into the promise of racial equality and justice for all. Greg Garrett has given us an indispensable gift, a clear-eyed guide for navigating this challenging era of cultural change and backlash.”

Join Me For the Next RD Author Salon

As a reminder, these occasional live author salon events are for paid subscribers only. But good news—I’m still offering a 25% discount on all annual paid subscriptions through July 4th. You can upgrade to a discounted paid subscription with the button below and get access to future author salons throughout the year.

You can watch the full conversation above, and there’s more about Greg and his new book below! And, if you buy Greg’s book using one of the links from this newsletter, a portion of your purchase goes to support the Redeeming Democracy newsletter.

Onward,
Robby

---

About Greg Garrett and White Lies

About Greg

Greg is a long-time collaborator and friend. Formally, he is the Carole McDaniel Hanks Professor of Literature and Culture at Baylor University and Canon Theologian for the American Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Paris, France. Some of you may remember my conversation with him at the American Cathedral in Paris or our last author salon conversation on his last book, The Gospel According to James Baldwin. He has published over thirty books, including A Long, Long Way: Hollywood’s Unfinished Journey from Racism to Reconciliation (2020). Greg also writes the Good Trouble substack newsletter.

About White Lies

For centuries, white men in the West have cultivated and perpetuated a set of false narratives about Black people in order to subjugate and maintain power over them. Some of these myths originated abroad but flourished in America, while others were cultivated solely on American soil. All of them, however, continue to find expression in the present as white supremacy strains to maintain its privilege.

White Lies analyzes ten of the most dangerous and pervasive of these myths and observes how they still emerge in political discourse, legislation, pop culture, and religion. This racist rhetoric is present in the words of Abraham Lincoln, George Wallace, and Donald Trump, and the power of white Christian nationalism often evokes these myths, sometimes so subtly listeners may not be conscious of how they are being manipulated. White Lies connects the dots between past narratives, images, and ideas, and present speech about violence, urban life, the suburbs, voter and welfare fraud, and white saviors. It explores myths that individuals and communities may employ to avoid confronting racism, including the notion that America is either post-racial or that white people are the group most liable to suffer discrimination. While these myths continue to spread, White Lies also notes some of the powerful competing narratives which seek to correct them.

---

ICYMI at Redeeming Democracy