John Ireland

John Ireland works as a freelance journalist and filmmaker, based in Los Angeles. “I am fascinated by democracy in action,” he says. “In my work, I get to meet people who have passion for life… who choose to live life on their own terms. It’s where these lives and society intersect that I find the story.” He has focused on the gay rights movement, the electoral process and the effects of linguistics and semantics on everyday exchanges that connect us to one another. As a journalist, Ireland has been published in numerous periodicals, including Newsweek, In These Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Baltimore Sun, The Tampa Tribune, and The Advocate. He contributed a chapter to the book, "Losing It: The Virginity Myth." He has worked on a variety of social justice issues, but the issue of equality for lesbians and gays has become a recurrent theme in his work. FindingFamily.us In 2005, Ireland produced and directed a short film entitled, "Finding Family: Gay Adoption in the U.S.," which profiled the patchwork of laws affecting gay and lesbian parents across the United States. Since its 2007 premiere at San Francisco’s Frameline Film Festival, it has screened at festivals across the U.S. and Europe. In 2009, it aired on PBS and has educational distribution through Frameline. GetToKnowUsFirst.org After Proposition 8 passed in California in 2008, Ireland created a suite of Public Service Announcements (PSAs) with a non-profit film studio in Hollywood (POWER UP). The spots profile gay and lesbian couples and their children. These images, noticeably missing from the No on 8 campaign, have aired in all of California’s 58 counties since January 2009 after debuting during President Obama’s inauguration. What started as a cash ad buy has morphed into a sustained PSA campaign which continues in rotation in major media markets across California today. MarriageTrial.com In January 2010, Ireland and collaborator John Ainsworth produced a re-enactment of Perry v. Schwarzenegger, the federal district court challenge of California’s Proposition 8. Using over 3,000 pages of court transcripts and clocking in at 65 hours of testimony performed by professional actors, MarriageTrial.com holds the Guiness World record for longest documentary. As the actual court proceedings recorded by the judge were blocked from airing by the U.S. Supreme Court, the re-enactment of this historic trial is the only resource beyond the transcripts available for the public to see. R