Author name: Paul Darr

Paul Darr has lived in California, Oregon, Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, and currently lives in San Antonio, Texas. Paul is also an Army Veteran, who has deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. On the political spectrum Paul is a Classical Liberal and member of the Libertarian Party. Paul is currently employed as an IT Manager and is a father of a handsome boy and beautiful daughter. In his free time Paul enjoys reading, using and modifying open source software, gaming, and several other geeky pursuits.

Best lies have a bit of truth

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The best lies have a bit of the truth at the center. That is what I thought of when I ran across the story of Tim Ballard. Ballard has made himself a name as the rescuer of sex-trafficked individuals but has recently come under scrutiny as allegations of sexual assault and misconduct have come in against him. You can find more about the timeline of the allegations at this abc4.com article. Ballard is the center character in the movie “Sound of Freedom” but as anyone familiar with sex trafficking begins to examine the movie you can tell the stories have been greatly exaggerated or are likely fabricated. At first, I wasn’t going to say anything about the movie until learning of the allegations and that last week Ballard was excommunicated from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and received a public condemnation.

For those that don’t know, I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and we are often known by the nicknames of LDS or Mormon. I am also a survivor of all forms of childhood abuse and personally know individuals who had been trafficked from my time growing up in foster care. Excommunication in the LDS Church isn’t shunning as it can be in some churches but is a part of the repentance process and people can be rebaptized after completing the repentance process under the guidance of appropriate church leaders. For repentance of any major sin, a council is brought together for the decision, and a church court is convened. There are three levels of Church Courts beginning with the Bishops Court which can be appealed to the High Counsel Court which can be appealed to the First Presidency Court. For more information on Church Courts please read, “The Principles and Purposes of Church Courts”. 

“Members sometimes ask why Church disciplinary councils are held. The purpose is threefold: to save the soul of the transgressor, to protect the innocent, and to safeguard the Church’s purity, integrity, and good name.

The First Presidency has instructed that disciplinary councils must be held in cases of murder, incest, or apostasy. A disciplinary council must also be held when a prominent Church leader commits a serious transgression, when the transgressor is a predator who may be a threat to other persons, when the person shows a pattern of repeated serious transgressions, when a serious transgression is widely known, and when the transgressor is guilty of serious deceptive practices and false representations or other terms of fraud or dishonesty in business transactions.” (A Chance to Start Over)

For Ballard to be excommunicated he would have to participate in a High Counsel Court held by his Stake President and High Counsel, as that is the first level where the excommunication of a Melchesidic Priestholder can occur. A Church disciplinary council would never undertake to reverse a decision of the courts of law. So they often wait for legal proceedings to complete before taking action. When there is exceptional evidence they occasionally move forward before the legal proceedings are completed. So in Ballard’s case, there must have been some strong evidence. In addition, I have heard Ballard try to blow this off as him being excommunicated for going to strip clubs as part of his anti-trafficking work. Strip clubs are not something that will get you excommunicated. Generally serious sexual sins such as adultery and pedophilia or sins with victim such as murder will get a member excommunicated and sins like visitation of strip clubs would have a period of disfellowship (can’t hold a leadership position or pray for the congregation).  So we can deduce that the excommunication was related to one of the allegations of the women against him. 

So from understanding why he was excommunicated, I can’t recommend anyone watch the “Sound of Freedom” as it is a fictional work that purports to depict events that didn’t happen the way they were dramatized and also leaves out the sexual conduct of Ballard. Sex Trafficking is a major issue and I am disappointed Ballard decided to use his position of trust to abuse women and enrich himself. I hope my commentary will help those who are my friends and not members of my church to better understand what went on and its significance.

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Fall Lawn Recommendation’s

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Keep mowing your lawn. Grass growth will slow so you may only need to mow 1-2 a month for the grass itself. Mowing more often might be necessary if your lawn is primarily weeds.

Apply a fall fertilizer to help your lawn recover. I like a ratio of 16-4-8 in a liquid format before rain or watering the lawn. If using granular’s last month was really the last to apply one as they last several months and you don’t want the fertilizer to just feed winter weeds when you lawn goes dorment as it gets colder.

Apply a pre-emergent herbicide to prevent winter weeds. Check the label to make sure the weeds you had last year in your yard are on the label. Crabgrass, dandelions, thistle, nutsedge, and annual bluegrass are common.

If you have weeds that need to be removed, apply a liquid post-emergent herbicide like Spectracide, Bayer Advanced, or Image. This will kill anything existing prior to our pre-emergent applications. I find Spectracide works best on broad leaf weeds, Bayer Advaced works best on Crabgrass, and Image is the best at killing Nutsedge. Spectricide is the cheapest but it’s worth paying for one of the others if you have a particular issue with crab grass or Nutsedge. Also look at the ten day forecast when you do this and make sure it’s dry for a few days so that the herbicide isn’t immediately washed out.

I like to trim my trees later in the winter so now is also the time I inspect growth and decide which branches I want remove later to lift the canopy or help promote future growth in the right areas.

Fall Lawn Recommendation’s Read Post »

That time I had Measles

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So let’s go to a less emotional yet unique occurrence. Going back in memory a bit I remember while with my bio mom she took us to a clinic and got us vaccinations. They had to chase me around to get my shots. Unfortunately MMR wasn’t part of that vaccination.

Later staying with my bio-dad and his girlfriend. I remember feeling really sick and then I started getting spots and I was worried I was getting a different looking version of the chicken pox. It was a bit of a confusing experience as a kid. I remember staying on a couch downstairs for over a week. I remember them telling me later that what I had was the measles. Considering the lack of medical care and really even much home nursing, I guess I’m just a survivor. I later also had the MMR vaccine for school shot records so I guess now I’m pretty well protected against it by being double covered.

Nowadays I’m just glad my children don’t have to live through chicken pox and measles like I did as a kid.

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 1 in 20 boys under the age of 18 experience sexual abuse or assault

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1 in 20 boys under the age of 18 experience sexual abuse or assault. I’m not sure what the percentage was when I was a kid but that is what the current percentage is on RAINN.

I remember my biological father would sometimes have parties at the house. People would come and hang out while drinking,smoking, and other stuff. He had this large red pipe bong he would pull out. He also sold coke so I’m sure people were snorting that. The large glass table in the dining room would have been ideal for that though I can’t remember for sure. I do remember at other times when he weighed the coke into smaller bags and would break down the bricks of weed into smaller bags. All part of the family business.

People would also break off to other parts of the house and you could run into them making out or in other sex acts. Prior to this I had already been exposed to other sexual situations when my bio dad would casually leave pornos on the TV in his room. For a while he had my brother and I sleeping in their walk-in closet, so I would also catch when his girlfriend and him would have sex there also. That room was different in that it had an overpowering floral smell to cover up the cigarette smell from both of them. In this environment I think I came to associate those sexual acts with love as that must be what all that passion was about. 

At the parties one of the things that also made a regular appearance was a punch made of various alcohol, juice, and fruit in a cooler with ice. People would just dip in a cup for a drink. I remember getting some for myself and that it was better tasting than the beer except for that strong alcohol after taste. I guess people also thought it was funny to see a drunk six year old. 

After a bit I remember a couple walking me back to one of the rooms. I think this is one of the things I have tried my hardest to forget in my life, so I can’t really remember their faces. Every time I bring up the memory in my head, I see a smear over this part in my memory. Like I took an eraser and smeared the flashes of color and memory in my head. What followed though was that the man had his way with me. They kind of talked to me like they were teaching me it as a lesson. Luckily I don’t remember anything getting ripped or bleeding like I understand can happen. The woman used her hand and mouth and was pleased to make my little boy penis hard though she was disappointed I didn’t ejaculate. I wasn’t old enough for puberty for the last part to really work. There were other nights where other people touched me and did various things, but it’s fuzzy from the wishing to forget and the natural effects of alcohol. 

Whenever this happened, I was hoping to feel that love and acceptance I always wanted but never got that. I knew how to keep a secret so when asked, I was happy to do so about this. When I entered foster care, I learned this was something I should be ashamed of, so I never talked about it. I didn’t want anyone to look down on me for letting this happen to myself. I’ve hated myself for it and it’s one of those things that left a mark of hate and shame in my past. I know I was a child, but it’s still something that causes me pain and impacts me to this day. I have a tough time when people stand behind me; it causes a panic of memories of not having control of myself when being physically or sexually abused. 

 1 in 20 boys under the age of 18 experience sexual abuse or assault Read Post »