Raging Grannies stage war protest in west PBC

By Lona O'Connor
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 03, 2007

There is something poignant and quixotic about a covey of middle-aged women standing on a busy corner waving hand-lettered anti-war posters.

Wearing aprons, shawls and bonnets, they are literally shouting into the wind of speeding cars on U.S. 441 at Forest Hill Boulevard as they sing protest songs with a cranky amplifier that's not quite up to the job.

These are the Raging Grannies. Their grandchildren go to raves and they go to "rages," as they describe their demonstrations. They are part of a loose-knit coalition that also includes organizations like Code Pink: Women for Peace and the Palm Beach County Peace and Justice Coalition, among others.

This summer, Code Pink is targeting U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), to convince him that his constituents want U.S. troops home from Iraq. The campaign includes visits to his offices in West Palm Beach, Coral Gables and Washington and a postcard-writing blitz.

A Nelson aide in Miami described a polite but brief conversation with Code Pink women. An aide in Washington said Nelson will attempt to meet with Code Pink representatives before the August recess.

Though they welcome support from people of all ages and genders, Code Pink and Raging Grannies put women's faces in the forefront of their efforts.

"You get to a stage in life where you feel, if not now, when?" said Vicki Ryder, 65, a founder of Raging Grannies groups in Rochester, N.Y. and Palm Beach County. Ryder lives in Delray Beach during the winter. "I have got to make my life mean something."

The first Raging Grannies group formed in 1986-87 in Victoria, British Columbia. Their tactics then, as now, are to don granny garb and sing satirical songs against racism, environmental issues and war.

Code Pink was founded in 2002, when about 100 women dressed in pink set up a four-month vigil in front of the White House, calling for the nation to end the war in Iraq.

A number of women are members of two or more groups.

Their political actions often include an element of theater. In May they lined up hundreds of empty shoes at a Delray Beach park to symbolize civilians killed in the Iraq war.

Called "The Empty Shoes of War," [note from Web Granny: actual name is "Walk In Their Shoes"] the demonstration has been staged by other anti-war groups around the country.

Street theater has been used as a political tool in many countries because it is more immediate and personal than conventional political speeches and rallies.

Gloria Stein is comfortable using the granny persona to draw attention to serious issues.

"I call myself Donna Quixote, always fighting windmills," said Stein, 68, of Boynton Beach. "I've gotta do street corners. I have to vent. That's what I am. My children say that someday they will either find me in jail or dead," she said with a chuckle.

Out on the corner of U.S. 441 and Forest Hill, there are honks from passing cars, a few middle-finger salutes and one man on a bicycle who stopped to harangue the Grannies, then pedaled away.

Carole Fields, who just joined the Grannies in March after retiring, was unsettled by this up-close-and-personal encounter with an opposing point of view.

"He claimed to be a Baptist Republican Christian who did drill instruction for the Salvation Army. He had white hair and makeup. He was very combative and scary. I was glad when he left."

A woman leading a group of boys collecting for a sports league rebuffed Fields' attempts at conversation.

"I said, 'Why don't you join us?' and she got mad and said, "Don't talk to the children.' I don't know what she thinks we are."

Since their own activism goes back decades, the protesters are puzzled by the lukewarm response from college students, who have not mobilized in the numbers they would like to see.

"I think about Kent State all the time," said Stein, referring to a 1970 student demonstration against the Vietnam War at a university in Ohio, where four students died when National Guard troops opened fire on protesters. The incident, which shocked the nation, was already a memory before the current generation of students were born.

Progress has been slow, but steady, the protesters say.

"When we first spoke against the war, nobody came out," said Susan Mosely, 56, of Wellington, who is a member of both [the South Florida] Raging Grannies and Code Pink. "If people don't read it in the newspapers or see it on television, they don't believe it. Now we're getting some coverage."

Says Mosely, "All we can do is keep on keeping on."



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