Spoilt votes - post them here so that the parties/papers can see them

PJ I don't think you'll get your answer as like you and others have suggested, those patronising us not to spoil are not actually able to suggest a party deserving of our vote.

Nope. It's just the same old misogyny, internalised or otherwise, trying to force compliance on women.

PJ I don't think you'll get your answer as like you and others have suggested, those patronising us not to spoil are not actually able to suggest a party deserving of our vote.

I posted my spoilt paper last week and whilst the decision wasn't an easy one I now feel better about it than just picking "overall least shit option ". I've made it pretty clear on the paper why not one of them will have my vote.

Just popping this here again as a reminder of why to me a spoilt paper is a valid choice ...

I can't believe that you wouldn't use your hard won right to vote (and in my hope consider using it to oppose 5 years of having PM Johnson)

I'll ask again: would you rather I voted Tory or spoiled my vote?

History shows politicians don't care about those who don't vote - look how the EU citizens living either here or in Europe have been treated these past few years!

Not sure what EU citizens living in Europe has to do with anything. If you are talking about EU citizens living in the UK, they were denied the vote on Brexit because referendum rules are not the same as general election rules, and precisely because MPs cared about what they thought and might vote for. They were not non voters.

I don't need to tell you how long it took to get the matters of slavery, women's right to vote achieved.

How did voting help win the women's vote? Those men who were allowed to vote were not voting in favour of suffrage. Women won the right to vote through a combination of civil disobedience and their huge efforts to keep the country going in WWI.

Slavery was not abolished through voting. It came about through a combination of Parliamentary reform (the 1832 Act to get rid of rotten boroughs), the American Revolution that resulted in Britain losing it's grip on its plantation interests which had been served through slavery, and the industrial revolution that switched economic focus away from the American colonies to the domestic northern industrial cities. Plus civil disobedience and campaigning by slaves and religious groups respectively.

So, once again, explain to me how voting for the parties advocating self ID will bring about the end of this policy being pushed? Bear in mind that people within these parties who have argued against these policies have been hounded out. They don't want to listen to their own, so how will anonymously voting for these parties do anything other than endorse their self ID stance?

And, btw, as this is the feminist board, you really don't need to patronise the women on here about the importance of voting. Many of us will have voted in many elections and campaigned for/endorsed political parties over many years. Do you think we are spoiling ballots in some sort of hissy fit? Or do you think we might have poured over manifestos, listened intently to the leaders for a glimmer of hope and good sense on self ID, lobbied MPs/candidates to look at this issue from the point of view of the concerns of women, and finally concluded that voting for these parties would be total anathema?

The point has been made on the other threads but beards repeating - every spoilt ballot will be reviewed by the candidates or their agents, who will be looking for a way to claim it for their tally. So they will be seen.

Also, I wanted to post this story about the wank/not wank ballot paper as it came up on a previous thread and no-one could believe it was true.

www.joe.co.uk/politics/voter-writes-wnk-all-over-ballot-paper-puts-not-wnk-next-to-greens-deemed-acceptable-as-a-vote-233070

Fptp system guarantees that a lot of votes are essentially wasted. So if you live in a safe seat place, you might as well draw some tits or cock or whatever slogan you want. Won't make any difference but might make you feel better.

Nothing happens when you spoil your vote but something might happen if you vote.

Platitude. As has already been explained on this thread, under an FPTP system, it depends where you live. And a spoiled ballot from a politically engaged electorate is a very different matter to the alienation of not turning up at all.

And, as repeated over and over, non-compliant women derive their power from that non-compliance. Otherwise, their concerns are batted aside.

This is a feminist board, FFS.

I am going to spoil my ballot paper. I cannot in clear conscience vote for any political party who do not recognise that woman = adult human female. I have debated this with myself for so long and reached the conclusion that a spoiled ballot is the only option I have.

Nothing happens when you spoil your vote but something might happen if you vote. History shows politicians don't care about those who don't vote - look how the EU citizens living either here or in Europe have been treated these past few years!

This is the most important general election in our lives - this is the feminism chat group and I can't believe that you wouldn't use your hard won right to vote (and in my hope consider using it to oppose 5 years of having PM Johnson). You may not have achieved gaining the necessary level of interest in this matter - I don't need to tell you how long it took to get the matters of slavery, women's right to vote achieved.

(I have done this and not heard a peep back, despite sending follow ups. Treasonous cowards. Can't even stand by their own policies)

For all those people who would have voted Labour or LibDem but who aren't because of self-id, I strongly suggest you write to them (cc in HQ too, why not!) and spell it out in single syllables that explain betrayal of the female sex is what killed your vote for them.

Don't let them get away with blaming any loss on nasty people voting for other nasty parties.

I agree that identity politics is middle class. But the worst effects of its ascendancy will absolutely be on economically deprived and otherwise vulnerable women and children.

(Rough as fuck, me, I'm afraid.)

How laughable is it that the pomo-addled go around calling other people middle class?

My local Labour candidate is GC, so I shall be voting labour.

Well I always knew I was middle class
Obviously ballot spoiling seals the deal.
Like others, I live in a safe as safe can be labour area. They've always got in since voting started. My spoil wont matter to anyone except me. I will always know I sodding tried to keep women safer.
If you dont want to spoil, be my guest, go vote for whoever, but dont talk down to us like were "only" women. We matter, my daughter matters , all cunty type women matter.

I'm torn between spoiling and voting labour.
I cant vote labour due to them supporting self ID. However, our local labour candidate has fought to keep my daughters nursery open and appears to be active to try to improve the town. Not sure what the conservative who is actually in office has done recently. I don't know the labour candidates personal stance is on self id, but obviously they tend to have to stick to the party line.
So I will probably spoil my paper. In my opinion spoiling is better than just not voting. They do report the numbers of spoilt papers (I've seen it on the results for previous elections).

The fact that trans activists have heavyweight support behind the scenes doesn't change the fact that it is the embodiment of ID politics.
It literally erases women as a class.

There is nothing more middle class

Is that some kind of 'gotcha' - where people are supposed to bow down in shame and obedience, by any chance? People with more important things to consider than 'personal identity', such as feeding themselves and paying their bills, and so on......have no time for identity politics.

*There is nothing more middle class and self absorbed than identity politics
*

Please expand....Because for most of us here the trans ideology is the apotheosis of Identity Politics: snuck in under the radar when nobody is looking, and all debate and democracy silenced. The TRA movement is one of the most hideously undemocratic movements ever.....

And that is without factoring in all of the other unsupportable issues.

Well I'd happily tell people to vote. Because I think it's important to have a voice and use it. Even if no party overly impresses me, living in a democracy and voting in a party is important

Yes, we've all been there.....but voting should not be a reflexive action, but a considered one - else it means nothing but a box ticking exercise. I look forward to the day when a 'None Of the Above' box exists as a legitimate vote. Better still - I long for the day when someone appears who I can vote for wholeheartedly, or at least without major reservation

There is nothing more middle class and self absorbed than identity politics.

*Who the fuck do you think actually gives a shit8

How many swear words can you get into one sentence? Yeh! I'll vote for the winner. It's votes that count.

I live in a safe seat. Safer than safe. It is much more effective for me in terms of sending a message to the political class that women matter to take the chance of enough women spoiling their ballots and my effort being reported in the national press, than it is to waste it on any of the candidates, since the winner is already assured.

And even if this wasn't the case, I can fill in my ballot paper in whichever way I fucking well please.

It never ceases to amaze: the reaction that non-compliance in women provokes.

The threads and circulation of photos of spoiled papers (postal) will have a digital footprint.

There are enough journalists, public figures and even politicians that will see be lurking on threads like this and use their platform to talk about it.