# legal gay marriage vs. don't ask don't tell **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 20, 2009, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legal-gay-marriage-vs-dont-ask-dont-tell/514487 "2009-10-20T15:33:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2009, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legal-gay-marriage-vs-dont-ask-dont-tell/514487/21 "2009-10-20T21:34:30Z")
It says “a marriage or attempted marriage to someone of the same gender.” So the army doesn’t care if the Federal government recognizes or doesn’t recognize your gay marriage, you can be discharged either way. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2009, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legal-gay-marriage-vs-dont-ask-dont-tell/514487/22 "2009-10-20T21:34:49Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Wait, so on the one hand, we have the “Defense” of Marriage Act, which states that the Federal Government will not recognize gay marriage, and on the other hand, Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, which does in fact recognize gay marriage (albeit in a bad way). Since the DoMA is more recent, shouldn’t it have superceded that aspect of DADT? If statutes can be read without conflicting with each other, then that reading of the law controls. If they cannot be read without conflict, then either the more specific, or the last enacted, wins. It’s easy to read DADT and DOMA as laws that don’t conflict with each other, so there is no issue. IOW, your reading of the word “recognize” is an equivocation that wouldn’t appear in the context of either law. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legal-gay-marriage-vs-dont-ask-dont-tell/514487.md?page=1)