During his time as a residence director at UH Mānoa’s Johnson Hall, he was elected president of the University Gay & Lesbian ‘Ohana student club. When a gay student wrote a letter to the Ka Leo student newspaper contemplating suicide, John was asked if, as UGLO president, he would write a response. Worried about the negative reactions he might face, John was pleasantly surprised when many of the students at Johnson Hall came to sit with him in the cafeteria to show their support. “From there,” John said, “it just started snowballing. The UGLO meetings were originally just for UH students, but I started inviting everybody from any school and any age and that really helped create the beginnings of a state-wide LGBT+ ohana.”

The encouragement that he felt from his students in 1988 mirrored the strong community support that Out in Paradise received when it was on the air. According to John, despite at least one detractor appearing in the footage of a pride parade in 2008, it was very rare that the film crew faced any type of overt hostility. Rather, he remembered receiving grateful phone calls and letters from people saying, “I watch your show faithfully, I don’t have the courage to come out… so, you bring that to me, to my house, to my bedroom. They would watch this show, and it would uplift them. That’s why the theme of the show is celebrating– celebrating the many contributions [of the LGBTQ+ community].” This sentiment is reflected in the closing credits of each episode of Out in Paradise, which dedicates the program to the “many gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender individuals who have contributed so much to Hawaiʻi and make us all proud.”

Over the course of my internship, I had the chance to watch all of the digitized episodes, which only make up a fraction of the total collection. Out in Paradise depicts a picture of Hawaiʻi that is unvarnished, yet brimming to express love and aloha. The charmingly unpolished nature of the production–“a lot of the reporters I used weren’t really reporters, they were just friends,” laughs John–gives the show an earnest, human quality. There is a sense of community that can be felt from the efforts of everyone who gave their time (almost entirely as volunteers) to make this show possible. As an archival student, I am so appreciative of having the chance to catalog and describe the digitized footage, noting the names of the individuals featured on camera so that their identities can be preserved for future generations interested in sharing in the appreciation of the LGBTQ+ community of Hawaiʻi. I am also grateful for ʻUluʻulu and the Lei Pua ʻAla Queer Histories of Hawaiʻi project for providing support and stewardship for programs such as Out in Paradise. In what feels like an increasingly divisive time, portrayals of our history which unapologetically uplift activism, love, and community seem ever more important to preserve and share.

Some of the digitized episodes are available on the Queer Histories of HI youtube channel. 

Below is Episode 35, which aired in October 1998. A month before the November 3, 1998 election, the program focused on the “Protect Our Constitution” campaign, which opposed a proposed constitutional amendment that defined marriage as between one man and one woman. Hawai'i voters approved the amendment by a vote of 69.2–28.6%, and the state legislature exercised its power to ban same-sex marriage.