FYI - lesbian or gay service members who marry their partner are not entitled to ANY dependent benefits. That means no medical, dental, life insurance, or housing allowance pay.

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DADT was about getting kicked out for your sexuality, not all the minutia that go along with it...like dependent benefits.
Do they get spousal benefits?

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Hold my beer and watch this...

not really? who is responsible for that shit?

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HOCKEY IS BACK!

No. When I say 'dependent', I mean spouse and/or children. If you're active duty and you marry someone that isn't, they become your dependent.

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Well then the military has a different definition of "dependent" than the rest of the world.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

No different than anyone with a spouse that doesn't work...

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uh no.
On my insurance, my non-working spouse is listed as a spouse and my kids are listed as dependents.
In Federal tax returns, a non-working spouse doesn't get a dependent deduction either.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

As far as benefits go, having a child or having a spouse does not change any monetary benefits. They're listed as a spouse in various forms of paperwork and records, yes, but typically in the military, speaking about dependents doesn't matter whether its kids or a spouse. The money doesn't change.

I understand your point about taxes & life insurance, though, between the military and civilian world. As far as taxes go, of course when a tax return is filed they're classified as spouse. That's moot though, because military benefits that you get for dependents is non-taxable "income".

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Well it does suck, but I'll go back to the point that DADT was about getting your ass kicked out for being gay, not about equal benefits.
It seems that's a separate fight.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

There are more steps to take to get equality but allowing homosexuals to serve openly is a huge gain man. No they don't get dependent benefits but repealing it was huge. I think you need to rephrase your sentiment sir.

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I expected this to stray off topic for at least 3 or 4 more posts. Way to let me down.

I suppose that makes sense, I just assumed that the repeal would open up the benefits to them as well.

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Is finding myself agreeing with Cross a sign that the rapture is coming?

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I suppose I could, but that would take away from the shock and awe that I was going for with the subject

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Man you know as well as I do that the fight to let gays serve in the service is nothing when compared to the fight to get the base finance office to squeek out a single extra cent. Take that up a notch to re-writing dependent benefits military wide and you may as well as give up and go take a nap.

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Gays have always been allowed to serve in the military

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Gays have always been allowed to serve in the military [/quote]

Haha! As a medic man I saw loads of people I thought were gay. I went to a party for one of the Flight Med's NCOs and found out I was right the whole time. If you are a manly built woman with a cropped haircut and look a lot like Walter from The Big Lebowski then chances are you aren't sucking weiner. Conversely, if you have a lisp and wear a purple fanny pack on your off time trips to the BX then chances are also high that you may in fact suck the weiner. I don't know what it was like in more "military" like units but in the med group we didn't care much as long as you knew how to do your job and take care of patients.

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I was in an infantry unit...we knew who the gay guys were, they'd talk to some of us about it directly. Nobody cared, because nobody asked. Not only did nobody ask, but the gay guys did. their. jobs. That was all that was required of them. They were good Marines, and good people.

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Let gays marry and enjoy the benefits of divorce. I will buy tickets to the first one.

Seriously though they are people like everyone else. Who cares what they do in their bed chambers. If they are willing to sacrifice themselves to protect our freedom, who really gives a shit? Frankly I am tired of the bickering. Why can't we all put our sexual preferences aside and just get along?

BECAUSE THIS IS CHRISTIAN AMERICA GOD DAMNIT!

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You said it NYI. If civilians could visit military bases they would think that our force is made up of only Christians the way shit is set up. It is way to big of an issue to get into here and slightly off topic but oh yes, the Christian soldier theme is thick on a lot of bases and it makes me wanna puke. Check out the documentary Constantine's Sword if you are interested in how the military tends to treat people that aren't Christian. I saw it first hand and heard from people who worked at the Air Force Academy (my wife for example) how much reign the local shit head group...ahem....I mean Teddy Haggard's New Life Church were allowed to have on base. Anyway...moving on.

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