In recent years increasing attention has been paid to the aging of the American population. Ignited by Baby Boomers' realization that they, too, are going to get old, this attention has nonetheless remained lopsided. Though the boomer generation made its mark early on by instigating widespread social and political change, our societal views of old people remain narrowly bound by just a few fear-driven images. We have little regard for our elders (except, perhaps, those directly related to us), and we dislike thinking about our own aging except when purchasing skin-care products that promise to stave off signs of growing older. Forcing old people into the shadows of our peripheral vision denies them a cultural space in which they can voice their own identities. It also negates our potential futures.

The mainstream media contributes to this grey-out by selecting the issues older people are supposed to care about: primarily healthcare and developments to resist aging, but also vacation and retirement information, indicating that an acceptable old person is one who doesn't look old and who is financially successful. To define the interests of an entire group of p eople based solely on their biological condition or their investment portfolio is akin to relegating all young women's interests into reproductive issues or career information. The result is that the younger generations of progressives don't realize that there are elders eager to pass on pertinent activist information and thus we fear the coming of our own elder-hood.

The Raging Grannies, however, take stuffy politics and narrow-minded images by the throat, give them a good shake, then break into song about it - all in the name of raising awareness and saving the world. Alma Norman is an Ottawa activist, artist, and, at age 79, a Raging Granny. With experience born of years of work with society's "down and out" and the energy of a street clown, Alma and her cohorts dress up in funky old clothes and gather at local and global events to sing songs whose tunes sound traditional but whose lyrics call for social change.

Challenging stereotypes is just one of Alma's goals as she leads a physically and intellectually active life which includes participation in online communities where she often goes by the moniker Ragegran. She's quick to point out the persistence of stereotypes, saying, "The fact that hundreds of thousands of people disprove a stereotype doesn't kill it," and that she believes "the same stereotypes will continue to exist for old people." She wonders, though, if the acceptance of individual old people who break stereotypes (by being attractive or physically fit, for example) is one more way our cult of youth pushes the realities of aging into the background.

Fortunately for us, Alma is as vocal about this as she is about homelessness, racism, poverty, and environmental justice. The following interview evolved after many similar conversations online at the now-defunct Pleiades website where Alma was moderator of "Passages", a forum for older and younger women who wished to explore the complexities of women's aging in our society.

Wendy Smyer Yu: Alma, at Pleiades you used the name Ragegran. Tell us why and how it was related to your participation with the Raging Grannies.

Alam Norman: I ended up with the Grannies by fluke. Someone I knew belonged to the original Ottawa group, and she met me on the street one day, saying they were singing at a demonstration against the arms trade. I went and stayed! The group continued for some time, later disbanded, as groups often do, but I kept looking around for other possible Grannies. I lucked into getting to know one of the original Ottawa group who had retained an interest. We recruited two others and were in business! We've grown in numbers, visibility, and effectiveness since then.

We have two main goals. One is to change the world by getting people to really look at and act on issues such as peace, the environment, violence, social justice, racism. You name it and probably some Grannies are involved. The other goal is to change the view of grannies as old ladies that sit in their rocking chairs and knit the years away.

I'd wanted a name suitable for a forum about aging; relevant to the topic but tongue in cheek, to get attention, and possibly to get people thinking of aging differently. When I took over Passages it had focused largely on traditional topics relative to aging, especially health matters. I wanted to get beyond that.

WSY: What appeals to you about the Raging Grannies? How do you feel their effectiveness fits with other forms of action such as lobbying congress or what have you?

AN: Your question about HOW to act is very apt. There are all sorts of ways. Writing to politicians is one way, going to meetings and raising questions is another. Just bringing up a different point of view with friends can make a difference. There is no one effective way. I believe that people can only do what's right for them. I've gotten a lot more tolerant and less judgmental in my old age and I've realized there is no ONE "right" way. It can take more courage for a woman to speak up in her churchwoman's meeting than for someone like me to act out on the street.

But, I think that theater of any kind is a good political tool. I started my political life with street theater. With the Raging Grannies we make up our own words to tunes that people know, like folk songs. They're modified to suit different occasions and situations. We have no overall structure or director; each group is independent and very different in organizational style. Ours in Ottawa is very horizontal; ie. consensus decision making. Anyone who wants to can write songs and bring them to the group, where we might suggest changes. We might react to a law, or lack of one, or to an event, or to a problem that's not being dealt with. We decide on a date, time, place, write appropriate songs, and go out and sing!

WSY: Sounds like fun!

AN: Oh, yes, yes! For one thing, if you don't enjoy what you're doing, you probably won't stay with it! For another, satire is a very effective weapon. Laughing at people, making them appear ridiculous can be much more effective than engaging in long serious philosophical arguments. And violence, in the long run, does more harm than good. You need the "heavy" stuff, the information etc., but it all depends on how you use it. Our songs are funny, but our facts have all been checked out. Our songs focus on the satirical because it really is more powerful to laugh someone into changing by making the situation ridiculous than it is to try to out-POWER another; especially considering the power structure of money, police, laws, the press, and who benefits from that structure.

WSY: You mention being politically active at a young age. When, though, did the issues faced by older people come to your attention?

AN: Yes, I've been "politicized" since high school, so aging was just another thing to get political about. It was really the women's movement that got me thinking about aging because they talked about it so much.

WSY: What else informs your activism?

AN: There is, and has always been, a spiritual grounding to my activism. I feel very strongly that God's work can only be done by us human beings. The only person I can make decisions for is myself; so I have a responsibility for doing some of that work in whatever ways I can. There?s a Jewish concept, called tikkun olam which means the repair or healing of the world, which is where I am grounded. I should admit that very traditional Jews would interpret that term quite differently and much more narrowly without its social justice emphasis. But then I?m solidly on the liberal end of Judaism as I am with everything else!

WSY: How is it, growing old, both physically, and politically, as well as spiritually?

AN: I find myself, as I approach four decades, a typical example of the "modern" Old Woman (eg. I don't look my age, I'm open to new ideas and ways of acting, I'm physically active) and so I'm accepted and admired just because I don't look or act or seem old. I suspect, though, that what is at work here is something like hidden racism, anti-semitism, or homophobia?? but you're different, not like those others. But the price we pay for that "acceptance" is the same price those other groups pay: we're not fully ourselves, or not fully accepted as ourselves.

Maybe because I've always been physically active I do have a lot of difficulty with just accepting the physical realities of getting old; the loss of energy, mostly. It's not age itself that bothers me, numbers are only numbers, but there are implications of those numbers that I have yet to come fully to terms with.

Yet there's an interesting contradiction. I really feel I have more power now because I take it, I don't let things intimidate me. I think you have to refuse to accept powerlessness whether you're a woman, a nonwhite, poor, or whatever. Claim your right to be recognized and respected and act as though you had that right. And you have to be willing to accept the consequences (people laugh at you, gossip about you, tell untruths about you). What I draw on now is years of assuming I was someone with rights. I think that when I meet and talk to people what they sense is not so much what I say as my assumption behind what I say.

WSY: In our societal disdain for old people have we overlooked the hidden potential of growing old, then? That's the sense I get from you, that there's a trade-off; we lose physical strength, but there's the possibility to gain something else, maybe clarity?

AN: Oh, indeed I have found this to be true. But it took a very long time for me to accept the inevitable. A lot depends on your own personality and priorities, but since mine involved lots of physical activity, the lessening of physical strength and abilities was a huge blow. Once I decided to accept that my physical self, on several levels, was limited, I felt very much freer. I didn't have to "prove" to anyone that I could do anything. I felt as if I'd dropped a load off my shoulders that I'd never realized I was carrying. Strangely enough, though, making the choice to admit "weakness" has also proved to be great for the ego. It's one of the things which has allowed me to relax into age. In a sense, admitting "I can't" gives me control over what "I can".

WSY: What do you envision?

AN: I wonder if there is there a place in our society to incorporate ourselves as Elders not as terrific Old but Wow people though I'm not suggesting we stop being dynamic and active. I'm by no means suggesting that we go back to being the traditional Old Granny who sat in the rocking chair and retired from active life. The Raging Grannies will continue to rage, the Amazing Greys to amaze, the Grey Panthers to pounce.

But there seems to be a missing link between the active women we are (however we show this) and the wise women we also are. I'm wondering if there is some way that in our society we can find a place as true Elders, somewhere our experience and judgment will be respected and acknowledged.

It's not part of western culture. I see it as almost "sacred space", some place beyond sitting on a panel about housing for the elderly, drivers' licenses over 70, or questions of health. Are we so busy doing and showing that the Old have vigor and zest that we too have lost our way? We're so proud of not living OLD and indeed, living Young that we are in danger of uprooting ourselves, pulling up the deep tap root that ties us to our beginnings because it might hold us back. We're losing a sense of time and with it a sense of timelessness. What we need is a way to pass on wisdom and a world that wants to hear us.