Extinction Rebellion (XR) PDX held a Halloween protest march, and the Raging Grannies were there.
After the march, the group engaged in disruptive civil disobedience, blocking SE Hawthorne Street. The Grannies supported from the sidewalk.
Video of the event by XR America
Photographer K. Kendall was kind enough to let us display these gorgeous photos, taken at the event.
The Portland Raging Grannies participated in the first-ever nationwide LGBTQ+ virtual 5k/10k event to raise money and awareness for the LGBTQ+ community and local pride organizations. Not a race, this 5k or 10k event is more of a walk-a-thon people complete at their own pace, anytime and anywhere.
A portion of each Pride Stride registration entry fee supported local LGBTQ+ non-profit organizations across the United States.
Continuing the tradition of marching for justice and equality, The Portland Raging Grannies joined PDX to stand for Women’s rights and empower femininity.
The Portland Raging Grannies’ Racial/Immigration Justice Team submitted video testimony at the City of Portland Fall Budget Monitoring Process meeting on October 6, 2020. The following statement was entered into the record by Granny Teri Kaliher.
The Portland Raging Grannies want to see bold action from leaders on policing.
Now is the time to divest major funding from our current racist, broken police department.
City audits and other reports indicate that the PPB mismanages its money. Instead of giving the police a blank check and cutting other bureaus, the PPB should take a disproportionate cut in upcoming budgets. The savings need to be invested in ways that support the safety and community of our BIPOC neighbors.
We are faced with a number of problems, but the police have never been shown to be the most effective ways of dealing with problems in schools, transit, or homelessness. Police gang teams end up hurting the people they are supposed to protect. It is our understanding that police untrained in dealing with mental health crises would prefer to have trained professionals answer those calls. We support this.
SWAT teams, intelligence units, expensive “special units” and all the heavy fancy camo equipment and vehicles do not belong in community policing. Nor does qualified immunity.
Qualified immunity gives police overreaching power to act as they see fit with no legal consequences. People have protested this – and the police have been paid overtime, even when they have brutalized protesters. This doesn’t make sense.
Although funding for the PPB needs to be drastically reduced, the bureau needs increased funding for training and a review of officers’ conduct to flag any inappropriate behavior.
In the past, Portland Police have acted like they’re above reproach and above the law. Decreasing their funding can be a consequence for their lawless violence. We need increased funding for mental health, parks, fire departments, and of course education.
The PPB needs to be an important part of rebuilding our community. They can start by contributing funding.
Weekly, the Grannies stand on a corner and remind everyone how important it is to VOTE!
Portland's Raging Grannies say VOTE! #raginggrannies #vote https://t.co/nZ6nKQEMJt pic.twitter.com/byLjpD11b2
— David D. Levine (@daviddlevine) October 6, 2020
The Portland Raging Grannies attended this Unite Oregon march as support for the Black participants. We provided a few signs for marchers and went along, on the sidelines, to be a shield for them.
We support Black Lives Matter and are willing to help the movement the best way we can.
The Portland Raging Grannies, in mourning black and carrying a mock coffin, marched from Lownsdale Park to Pioneer Courthouse Square at 2:00 P.M. on Sunday, September 27, 2020 to encourage voting by all.
Democracy means the people have the authority to choose their governing legislation. Who people are, and how authority is shared among them, are core issues for democratic theory, development and constitution. Cornerstones include freedom of assembly and speech, inclusiveness and equality, membership, consent, voting, right to life and minority rights.
The Raging Grannies are deeply concerned that the right to vote and access to voting this year especially is threatened. Democracy is in danger as is our constitution. It is crucial that all who are able register their vote this November.
Good Sunday Afternoon, Everybody & Thank you all for joining us, The Portland Raging Grannies, as we conclude our “Don’t Let Democracy Die” March here in “Portland’s Living Room”, the place designed to welcome us all regardless of who we are or where we came from; the place where we all belong regardless of our age, our abilities, the color of our skin, or whom we love. This is OUR Pioneer Courthouse Square, a place where we come to celebrate, to protest, to sing and dance and listen to music and make speeches; a place where, even during these strange times of uncertainty and social distancing, we come to be together in community. Take just a moment to look around and let our eyes smile at each other over our masks.
We are here today to remind ourselves what that great experiment called Democracy looks like .…. to remember the words Government Of the People, By the People, and For the People; essentially a system in which it is We The People who have absolute rights to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, who are meant to have both equal opportunity and equal protection under the Law, and who have the authority to not only choose our leaders but to remove those leaders should they fail in their sworn commitment to uphold the Constitution.
Today we are at a crisis point and we are concerned, not just for ourselves, but for our children and our children’s children. We live in the eye of a Pandemic, with our planet’s clock ticking away the hours to irreversible climate change. We are in the midst of a year of enormous challenges …. from a virus that has already caused the deaths of more than 200,000 Americans to Police Brutality and wanton indifference to Black Lives; from devastating hurricanes to Climate Wildfires burning out of control…
And from an out-of-control Would-Be Dictator, a White Supremist worshiper of nothing but personal and corporate greed, who talks openly about “getting rid of the ballots”, who with his handpicked posse has been quietly setting the stage not for a peaceful transfer of power, but for a coup.
On the 100-year anniversary of finally acquiring the vote, WE THE WOMEN PEOPLE especially cannot let that happen. WE THE PEOPLE, ALL THE PEOPLE must not let our democracy die. WE THE PEOPLE must Show Up, Step up and Stand up NOW. RIGHT NOW! At the very least, WE MUST VOTE! The deadline for Voter Registration in Oregon is October 13th. If you’ve never voted before, NOW is the time to start. THIS YEAR, WE MUST VOTE AS IF OUR VERY LIVES, OUR VERY DEMOCRACY, AND OUR VERY PLANET depend on it. Because they do.
Can we close our time together this afternoon by speaking in one voice: DON’T LET DEMOCRACY DIE. VOTE!
Thank You.
Sulima Malzin
for the Portland Raging Grannies
The Portland Raging Grannies held a vigil for the Notorious RBG on Thursday, September 24.
After a brief memoriam and readings, we marched across Tilikum Crossing, the Bridge of the People. Words and photos of the event follow.
WELCOMING WORDS FOR RBG MEMORIAL
Hello and thank you so much for joining us, the Portland Raging Grannies, here tonight on The People’s Bridge, as we take time to honor, perhaps the greatest of America’s Great Ladies.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a woman who loved life and lived it large in every sense of the word. The brilliant light of her indomitable spirit has shone far and wide, and though the tiny body in which that spirit was housed for 87 and a half years has left us, there is no doubt that light will continue to shine as a beacon for generations of women to come. As admired and “notorious” as she was, Ruth Bader Ginsburg never lost her humility. She was always ready to recognize and honor those who paved the way for her, even as she was breaking new ground for us and for our daughters and our granddaughters and for all Americans, regardless of their race or disability or gender expression. And not the least of those she credited was her mother, Celia, who according to Ruth, had proudly marched in the Suffragette Parade to Get the VOTE for women, and had advised her daughter from a very early age, to “Be Independent.”
In an interview at Columbia a few years ago, when the conversation turned to opportunities her mother didn’t have, Ruth answered in her typical hint-of-a-smile fashion: “When I talk about my mother I sometimes like to ask the question, What’s the difference between a bookkeeper in the garment district and a Supreme Court Justice? – one generation.” …. One Generation.
Ruth was both a fighter and a lover. She was as funny as she was serious. She was open and honest and said things about herself like: “I struck out on three grounds. I was Jewish. I was a woman, and I was a mother. The first raised an eyebrow, the second raised two, and the third made me indubitably inadmissible.” But Ruth was never one to take ‘no’ for an answer, and never one, as she put it, “to sit in a corner and cry.” She was not afraid to dissent and we know how beautifully she could do that. In the case of Shelby County vs Holder when the court gutted the Voting Rights Act, her dissent included these words: Throwing out pre-clearance when it has worked and continues to work is like throwing away your umbrella in the middle of a rainstorm, just because you’re not getting wet …. Wouldn’t she have made a great Raging Granny?
Once upon a time, so the story goes, Ruth wanted to be an operatic diva. Instead, she became a pop culture icon and a Rock Star of the Supreme Court. But her love for opera and theater never went away and over time she became so loved by the opera community that last Friday night upon receiving word of her death, every opera house across the country dimmed their lights. “Art is what makes life beautiful” she said, and what was she, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, if not a magnificent piece of timeless art?
While it is true that our country has lost a hero, it is the World and the Human Race that has lost one of our finest Beings. May she rest in Peace and Power as we walk together in her memory across “The People’s Bridge” carrying her light and her courage and her wisdom. And let us not forget what she said about not sitting in a corner and crying. Tonight we grieve. Tomorrow we fight!
Thank You.
Sulima Malzin,
for The Portland Raging Grannies
August 22, 2020 was a National Day of Action for Medicare for All. The Portland Raging Grannies were honored to show up and amplify this important message.
Our health care system fails to provide quality care to every US resident and wastes hundreds of billions of dollars a year in unnecessary administrative costs. The COVID-19 pandemic has only further highlighted the need to completely overhaul US health care. A Medicare for All single-payer system would expand and improve the cost-effective and administratively efficient Medicare program to finance comprehensive, high-quality health care for everybody in the US.
The Portland Raging Grannies held a march of mourning downtown, carrying a casket to honor the lives lost to police brutality.
MEDIA
