One of a handful of anti-abortion demonstrators stands outside the Cannon House Office Building on Capitol Hill November 5, 2010 in Washington, DC. The demonstrators demanded that House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), the presumed speaker of the House, pass aggressive anti-abortion legislation or they will find candidates to challenge the Republican leaders in the next primary elections. (November 4, 2010 - Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images South America)

Note from Anne. We’ve seen the power of Facebook operating in Egypt. I’ve met a wonderful woman Lisa Catherine Brown, who is as adamantly angry over the move of America’s patriarchy — led by House Speaker John Boehner — against American women as I am.

Lisa is a regular AOC reader who has been moved to action. Our Facebook friendship and Lisa’s excellent research and writing skills make her an articulate, reasoned and passionate contributor to the cause of women’s rights.

Lisa will be writing often on women’s issues for Anne of Carversville.  I hope readers will be as impressed with her thinking as I am.

I’ve encouraged Lisa to be revealing, caustic, opinionated and blunt and as often she wishes. Like me, she is a religious fact checker, which is my own passion. Beyond that, Lisa Catherine Brown is on her own, without my intervention. Anne

PETITIONS. PETITIONS. AND THE ONE THAT MAKES MY BLOOD BOIL

My name is Lisa Catherine Brown. As a Michigan-based, patriotic mother of four kids with a wonderful husband and two rapes in my pedigree, I receive dozens of e-mails a day asking for support for everything from saving the whales, wolves and fish in the ocean to the ocean itself to political pleas to stop or support legislation of many kinds; environmental, humanitarian, political, local, national, global, etc. – so many decent and worthy causes and often so little time and resources to fathom and make sense of it all.

One request in particular that really riled me was a petition against new legislation introduced to Congress that would redefine rape in cases of federally funded abortion. I have an itchy trigger finger when asked to defend pro-choice issues because I am a rape survivor. But this isn’t about my story – I’ll save that for a future post perhaps. This is about how patriarchal, societal, dogmatic and very Christian rhetoric is still alive and well in 21st Century America, still trying to control women, still playing God with women’s bodies, in the name of God or One Nation Under God.