About 

About The Raging Grannies and Friends of Oak Park

The Raging Grannies and Friends of Oak Park began as a response to the despair the founder, Mary Nelson, felt when Trump was elected president in November 2024.  After the January 2025 inauguration, she could no longer pretend Trump was not president of the United States.  After a few months of cowering in a fetal position on the sofa, Mary realized that denial was not going to work.  She needed to find a way to resist.  Mary noticed Raging Grannies groups performing protest songs on Instagram and thought, “I can start a Gaggle where I live!”  Together with Anne, Mary’s wife, and good friend Mary Anne, the Oak Park Gaggle was formed in May, 2025.
 
Membership is open to all “women of a certain age” and their friends—anyone who wants to fight for American democracy.  For the sake of our children and grandchildren, we sing songs promoting peace, democracy and peace, economic and racial justice.  We sing anywhere we are invited (and sometimes just a pop-up performance where we think singing will help our cause).

As it says on the Raging Grannies International website:  “We are totally non-violent, believe in only peaceful protest (with lots of laughter), work for the ‘many not the few’… and see our work as the spreading green branches of a great tree, rising up to provide shelter and nourishment for those who will come after us.”
 
For background information of Raging Grannies as an international movement, see the Wikipedia entry at   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raging_Grannies  and   https://raginggrannies.org/raginggrannies.org/