Raging Grannies Kick Up a Storm

ARTICLE FOR FOLKLIFE MAGAZINE

A sharp sense of humour. A passion for activism. A sprinkle of sass. Right away, it’s clear that the Raging Grannies embody all these traits. They come together to disrupt the status quo, showing that grandmothers care about more than knitting and ensuring their grandchildren are well fed.

Amid the hubbub of locals chatting with vendors and tourists browsing goodies at the farmers’ market, there were the Raging Grannies, singing away. They appear harmless enough at first: a group of elderly women wearing flamboyant dresses, shawls, and hats, singing classic tunes in harmony.

Upon drawing in a little closer, however, you would discover that the lyrics are more contentious than “How Much is That Doggie in the Window?” That is to say . . .

“Take your freakin’ frackin’ drills and keep them from our town

We don’t want your freakin’ frackin’ turning all our water brown

Take those freakin’ frackin’ drills or we will shut you down

Hydrofracturing just sucks!”

“We don’t have jobs anymore, and we can’t get fired, so we can say what we like,” says Susan Paynter, a member of the Raging Grannies for more than 15 years. “We discovered that people respond to humour better than anger.”

Susan sings along with Audrey Wild and Sue Sheane, also long-standing members of the Salt

Spring “gaggle,” as they call themselves. When the three connected with the Grannies, all were in search of community and justice—a place where one might find kinship among the noise of society. They wanted to use their voices to take action while breaking down barriers of ageism and sexism.

The Raging Grannies were founded on the West Coast of Canada in 1987 to protest the US Navy warships and submarines that were threatening public health and the local environment. Now, 100 gaggles are raging across the world.

Rather than using shame as a protest tactic, the Raging Grannies opt for satire in the form of song to get their points across, knowing how hard it is to be cross with Grandma.

Each Granny adds her own flair to the Salt Spring gaggle. Sue is a sprightly firecracker of 75 who has “fully lived and earned every one of those years!” she says with a boisterous laugh. “I’ve moved around so much in my life that I know how to immerse myself in a community. I had seen Ottawa’s gaggle of Grannies, so the first thing I did when I moved to the Island was look through the phone book and call around and ask about their group here.” Her vibrant personality is reflected in her prized chapeau, and a button pinned to the top reads, “Site C Still SUCKS.”

Meanwhile, Susan, with her calm and poised personality, is deemed the organizer and the artist of the group, stemming from her years as a home economics teacher. She gushes about the fulfillment she gets from fighting for what she believes in. “I wasn’t involved with activism working and raising my kids, so I kind of felt it was my turn to start fighting for the future of our planet,” she says. “I joined the Grannies, and I liked comparing stories with the women involved. I was younger than most of them, but I respected their commitment. We weren’t fussing about fitness, up-to-date clothing, makeup, or financial gain—I loved that!”

Her artistry is apparent in her own cherished headpiece: a striped, frilly bucket hat adorned with myriad buttons. A long feather protrudes from the top, given to her by a man from Penelakut Island who was standing alongside her in the fight to save a First Nations burial site from development. Susan’s favourite accessory is a shirt that says, “If You Love Something, Stand Up For It.” “If we all followed that mantra, our world would be in better shape,” she says.

At 91 years young, Audrey is the elder of the group. She joined in 1989, caring about each of the Raging Grannies’ core values: peace, justice, and the environment. Born during the Great Depression and witness to the devastation and recovery post-war, Audrey realized from a young age the importance of advocating for peace and committed to doing so for as long as she could.

Audrey was an educator in her working life and did her best to promote the causes she thought important. She notes that issues such as overfishing, clear-cut logging, racial discrimination, and gender equality are all still being fought for. “I was always into the environment, too, and was a great propagandist as a teacher.” Now, her favourite part of Grannying is performing. “I’m a bit of an exhibitionist! I can never stand still when we’re singing.”

All three women describe the connection they feel to the other Raging Granny groups around the continent, each fighting issues specific to their region. “We’re all similar in the way that we approach protests; the issues we’re fighting are just different,” Susan says.

“A lot of issues we were protesting back in the 1980s and 90s are still issues we’re fighting today,” Audrey says. She remembers visiting Clayoquot Sound to protest over-logging, and there, standing among the towering ancient cedars, was an elderly man with a cane who said, “I fought for my country in the Second World War, and I’m still fighting for my country.”

Dejectedly, Audrey says, “Some things never change. Then it was Clayoquot, now it’s Fairy Creek.”

“We just change the name of the politician,” Susan adds.

And despite the challenges involved in every social or environmental issue, it’s the collaboration and camaraderie that keeps the group going. Their hope is to pass the torch on to future generations.

In such an intergenerational collaboration, the Grannies teamed up with 28-year-old environmental activist and singer-songwriter Luke Wallace to sing his “Nonviolent Anti Petroleum Blues.” The performance is immortalized on YouTube in a video of Luke and the Grannies sitting around a table with cakes and cheeses and even a cheeky gin & tonic, with the Grannies dressed in full regalia and all chiming in on the chorus addressed to the oil industry: “I ain’t going nowhere!”

“It’s mostly the young people giving us thumbs up when we sing at the markets, so that’s really encouraging,” says Sue.

Susan, Audrey, and Sue all agree that the fight for justice requires vigilance, dedication, and commitment, no matter what age you are or where you come from. “That’s the whole point of the Raging Grannies—people don’t really expect much from an old woman. If you feed all the stereotypes—if you pretend to be old and frail—and then break them, you become much more memorable,” says Sue. “As women get older, they begin to get a little more assertive. Women who are used to sitting at home are all of a sudden getting dressed up and going out, or starting their own businesses, or, you know, making a fuss! Making trouble.”

“There are no requirements to join. You don’t have to be a grandma, you don’t even have to know how to sing properly,” Susan says. “You just have to have some fighter spirit in you!”