Accommodation with this adversary? No.

“They want me dead!” answered the acclaimed author of a bestselling novel about a transgender child: for years, the most banned book in America.

We were sharing the stage during a panel discussion about book-banning, at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, in Amherst, Massachusetts. I’d been spit-balling a thought that MAGA book-banners’ opposition to the Iran War might mean they could be convinced to help us expel Trump from office, so, therefore, maybe we should utilize MAGA’s weird obsession with us children’s book-people who celebrate LGBTQ and BIPOC lives, to turn the tables on them, reaching across the aisle, to talk sense to MAGA.

As an example, I’d told how the mean kids who’d bullied me in fourth grade had in later years supported my high-school underground newspaper, because, that newspaper had specialized in satirizing our domineering high-school principal—who those bullies had also disliked.

It was a stretch….

One of the author’s friends, in the front row of our audience, commented, “That’s something cis straight white men could do.”

Pointing out that such a “Let’s Make Friends” idea could only come from my position of privilege.

***

Three weeks later, during another panel discussion about book-banning—this time at Bethlehem Area Public Library—another children’s book author explained why it was that he’d stepped forward to serve as co-chair for the Pennsylvania chapter of Authors Against Book Bans. He said, “As a straight white male author, I felt it was my responsibility to stand up for my gay, Black, Asian, and Latino friends who are bearing the brunt of this. When they fight back against book-banning, it’s more dangerous for them than it is for me.”

I was hearing him confirm the other author’s friend’s comment, from three weeks before.

As for this Pennsylvania author’s perspective on the possibility of compromise with MAGA book-banners: he spoke with vigor and directness about MAGA’s blatant hypocrisy, energetic cruelty, and vicious lying, supporting his comments with detailed and shocking anecdotes.

Accommodation with this adversary? No.

***

After these panel discussions—puzzling over whether I fully agreed that we anti-book-banners couldn’t in some way team up with newly anti-Trump MAGA people like Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene… —I recalled a personal experience, from a time when I had tried to reach across the political divide—and…it had backfired.

So much so that…President Trump himself had cordially pumped his fist to me, in greeting.

Well: he’d thought I was a giant space alien.

***

“Look at this, Trump’s coming to Allentown,” my friend the founder of the Big Nazo puppets exclaimed. It was October 2020, two weeks before election day. Lots of my friend’s gigs had been cancelled because of the COVID pandemic, so he’d decided to spend a week in Easton, Pennsylvania, with my wife Gaia and me. We live in the swing county of Northampton, where targeted arts action can have disproportionate impact. A couple of friends already had suited up for two outings in the Big Nazo body puppets: we’d moved in slow motion through town, embodying gigantic Yuranian Space Aliens, carrying protest signs reading, “Vote Justice Peace,” and “Vote Unity Truth.” If people came close to inspect us, we did not speak. We were huge and weird, but non-threatening. My friend’s puppet-back-story was that our Yuranian spaceship had just landed on earth, and we were bringing a message of intergalactic peace to all mankind.

My friend continued, “We have to go to this Trump rally. It’s out by the airport. Who’s gonna be free?” I started texting and emailing. Everyone who’d worn the costumes that weekend was unavailable to perform at a weekday rally. I lined up staff to work at my bookstore, so I could go myself.

The morning of the Trump rally, my friend parked his van at a gas station a mile from the airport. We suited up in our space-alien body puppets, hoisted our “Vote Justice,” and “Vote Truth” signs, and started moving in slow-motion down the road towards the rally site.

Cars driving past reduced speed to let riders gawk.

As the minutes passed, it got tougher, dealing with the weight of the costume. Being a body-puppeteer is about committing to staying in character. I tried to visualize what people were seeing: since I was watching my friend, I had a pretty good idea. I kept the slo-mo arm and leg action going.

As we got closer to the rally, there were more people crowding around. I was anxious that people might realize we were the opposition, and warn us to get the hell out. Our signs seemed like a pretty big tip-off. But weirdly, people were giving us thumbs-ups and big smiles. Our “Vote Justice” and “Vote Truth” signs apparently didn’t seem anti-Trump to them. So strange! One guy yelled, “Nice Halloween costumes!” Another shouted, “Klingons for Trump!” I sidled up to my friend and whispered, “They think we’re on their side.” He answered, “Don’t talk.”

I realized that I’d anticipated an angry vibe. On TV, Trump rallies seem hopped up on hostility. But this crowd was relaxed and jolly. Their festive in-crowd energy was holiday-picnic. Still, I figured they’d go Lord of the Flies on us if they knew we were anti-Trumpers.

I could hear Trump making his speech, amplified from far off. We were way at the back, among lots of people clustered on an access road. A woman was peering through my monster-helmet right into my eyes. She carried a sign that said, “Love Thy Neighbor.” I understood that, like us, she was an anti-Trumper. Another guy had also decided we were infiltrators. Quietly, he told us, “After he’s done, Trump’s car will leave along here. I’ll unfurl this banner when he comes.”

The speech was over; the audience was breaking up. Cars were coming down our access road. As I stared at the limousines slowly driving, there was Trump himself not ten feet away, looking out his car window into my face. He pumped his fist!

Our neighbor let his banner unfurl; it whipped in the wind as he shouted its words: “End Fascism in America! End Fascism in America!”

Trump’s motorcade drove away.

My friend had been using a small video camera on an extension-rod to film the entire scene and ourselves. Now, he and I started moving, along with the crowd, while he kept on filming. As we slo-mo walked past houses along the road, a woman standing by a pick-up truck ran over to us and insisted, “Come on here, we want to get pictures with you!”

Her pick-up displayed huge banners: “Fuck Your Feelings” and “Trump 2020.” Her friends and family surrounded us: they were thrilled to be getting selfies with giant space aliens.

There was no escape. This excited Trumper-clan kept calling passers-by to come and get pictures packed in together with space aliens in front of the “Fuck Your Feelings” and “Trump 2020” banners.

We’d been coopted!

After ten minutes, we managed to push out and away from the Trumper pack; we moved down the road.

My friend whispered, “Look, that house has a Biden lawn-sign. We gotta get some footage in front of it.” We moved onto the lawn, and he extended his camera, to film us in front of the Biden sign.

People passing by exclaimed, “Hey—are they for Biden?” I felt a surge of fear. Would they surround us? We started walking again, trying to go faster, as we headed for the van.

We made it unmolested. We’d been in costume for five hours

I’m sorry to say, our effort at political outreach and activism probably didn’t change any minds. …Although—two weeks later, Northampton County did vote majority Biden.

So, the moral is… no, I’m not going to reach out to Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene to propose they stop it already with the book-banning. Just because they oppose Trump on a few issues like the Iran War doesn’t mean they’ll change sides on culture-war issues. MAGA people are in too deep with their pack to see eye-to-eye with the real me.