Back in October, the Yes on 8 "people" challenged California's Superintendent of Schools, Jack O'Connell, to a debate about gay marriage. According to Yes, even the remotest possibility of learning anything about gay marriage is harmful to children. Nothing hateful about that!

Anyway, the side refuse to debate. In fact, not only did (self-described) Campaign Manager Steve Smith hide from the debate, but his response was obscured from public view in a hard-to-find PDF. (But we dug up the text and included it after the jump.)

But now there's a debate happening for real! Gloria Allred and Andy Pugno will argue about how California defines marriage On January 14 at The National Center for the Preservation of Democracy, 111 North Central Ave, Los Angeles. (Gloria is one of the lawyers suing to overturn Prop 8; Andy is a lawyer who opposes California's equal protection clause.) Tickets are $20, and throwing of vegetables is strictly forbidden.

This is a fight that, obviously, the gays will win in the long run. In fact, the run probably isn't even that long. Getting the anti-marriage folks on record, explaining just how crazy their position is, can only hasten along the cause of civil equality.

Disclosure: SFist_Matt is the creator of Stop8.org, and does behind-the-scenes organizing for the gars.

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