To let people know how to spoil their ballot?

[HoofWankingSpangleCunt]

Today 13:59HoofWankingSpangleCunt

This election has really brought it home to me how uncomfortable I am voting for any of the three main parties. I don't want to vote for the local Independent on a donkey sanctuary ticket* just because I feel I have to vote for someone. If I do that my concerns about the other parties goes unnoticed.
So tonight Matthew, I'll be spoiling my ballot. It has to be done a certain way to count as spoilt. If enough of us do this then voices will be heard.
advice on how to do it correctly
I'm going to pop my AIBU Vote Button cherry on this thread as it seems apt.
*Or whatever the local issue is.

Subject:
To let people know how to spoil their ballot?

Message:
This election has really brought it home to me how uncomfortable I am voting for any of the three main parties. I don't want to vote for the local Independent on a donkey sanctuary ticket* just because I feel I have to vote for someone. If I do that my concerns about the other parties goes unnoticed.
So tonight Matthew, I'll be spoiling my ballot. It has to be done a certain way to count as spoilt. If enough of us do this then voices will be heard.

I'm going to pop my AIBU Vote Button cherry on this thread as it seems apt.
*Or whatever the local issue is.

slipperywhensparticus
Yes let's all spoil our ballot or not vote at all that will really show people we are serious wont it

It actually would show that people where serious, but as various people delight in calling others names for using their vote in a way that they choose, it will never happen.

And FYI a NOTA box has been ratified and allowed on the ballot, but strangely the powers that be won't put in on the ballot.
Maybe just maybe they are scared of what the 70% would do if they could actually vice an opinion on the system.

If that 70% actually VOTED things might be really different, rather than dicking around spoiling a vote that could genuinely make a difference.

That is really interesting, BoneyBackJefferson, a NOTA option on the ballot would certainly send a message. The fact that this ratified inclusion hasn't be included on the ballot shows that we don't live in a democracy at all... just a little 'sheep pen' with fixed parameters so that we can't upset the status quo.

OrangeSlices998

How is a vote that ratifies the current system going to get the system changed?

Safe seats are only safe because people who oppose them don’t show up to vote!

This is not true. Some seats are safe because the constituency is made up of 70% of people who can't be arsed to vote, but only a minority of those would actually vote in opposition to the 'safe' party, if they've thought about it at all.
Of the remaining 30%, about 25% of them are staunch supporters of the safe party. The people who oppose them DO show up to vote. They'll just never get anywhere in that seat.

This whole thing makes me so cross. It’s such a ridiculous privilege to have the right to vote and not care enough about the consequences for those who need decent health and social care and who will be harmed by the Tories getting in by default.

I care deeply. I want to vote. I want my vote to count, somehow. It never will here, in this place that I live. I want there to be more visibility about proportional representation, about being able to actually engage the majority of people who WON'T VOTE EVER because politics is so pointless to them because they're not heard.

“Protest voting” is how the UK ended up with the shit show that is Brexit because people decided to be cheeky and vote out instead of actually thinking shit through.

Bugger off. I'm NOT responsible for Brexit!

So who should I vote for and why @OrangeSlices998 . In my constituency, where the sitting Labour amp/candidate has backed a massive green belt destroying development without first backing the of sorting local infrastructure. Which is already crippled.

I don’t know where you live or what you value. But you do. So register to vote, and use your vote for something. There must be SOMETHING that you give a monkeys about - the NHS? The police? Education? Housing? Use your vote, it’s a bloody privilege.

@BoneyBackJefferson How is drawing a smiley face on your ballot paper going to demonstrate your support for a different voting system or better candidates? How would you like the winning MP to interpret your lack of a vote? Mind reading?

Which of "people's concerns" are going to be recognised & improved due to the 2016 Referendum result?

If you have to advise people how to spoil their ballots then quite frankly they are too stupid to vote in the first place.

And the vote counters don't categorise spoiled ballots. They are just all counted together. So if you wanted to sock it to the Tories/Labour/LidDems they will never know as to why the ballots were spoiled. They will only ever be told the total number of spoiled ballots. Not how many had a knob drawn over the Labour Party candidate or how many had Liar scrawled across the Tory Party candidates box.

If you want to spoil your ballot that's totally up to you. But what an absolute fucking waste of a vote that was very hard fought for over years. You really can't vote for somebody? Really? Howabout you vote for the party that is likely to do the best for your community or the interests you care about?

@NoSquirrels Just because you may live in constituency which isn’t a swing vote doesn’t mean your vote is meaningless. I live in an incredibly safe Labour seat, has been for decades. 1 vote won’t make a difference but I’ll still bloody vote, no individuals vote counts more than any other. We don’t only have a worthy vote if it guarantees us the result we want and/or we cause a huge change.

First past the post is such a crap system - most people live in a constituency that has such a large majority that their votes count for nothing.
I always 'vote' - usually by making accross my ballot paper with diagonal lines and "I want propotional representation" inside that.

I'm actually considering voting propely this time, as I have a high profile shadow minister who is a crap constiuency MP; this is on the basis that a spoild vote is simply someone that didn't vote for her; voting forsomeone else is that lack of a vote for her, plus a vote against her. She got over 60% in 2017, with LibDem/Tories evenish and a handful of randoms.

2017 was fun - i campaigned for a friend standing against Theresa May.

Spoil it any old way. As long as you don't make it ambiguous it'll be fine.

What do you mean by 'recognised as a rebellion' @PBo83 ? Do you think the OP thinks she''s Che Guevara?

All spoiled ballots are counted as spoiled ballots - objective achieved.

There will be a lot of political lackeys on mn at the mo trying to snap up the floating/despondent voters by getting us to vote for the 'least worst option'. Don't give them the satisfaction.

I would vote for the donkey sanctuary party just to be sure they didn’t lose their deposit.

FFS, that's just a waste of a vote and the behaviour of a fool.

The spoiling of the vote not what the last pp said.

@OrangeSlices998

Why do you think that I am not politically active?
And its not the lack of a vote its a vote against a broken system, one that some of us actively campaign and protest against, the truth of it is that I probably do more politically than you do, because I do so much more than visit a voting booth.

Women died for us to be able to vote. One of them WILL be in power regardless of your spoilt vote - you may as well use your legal right and have a say. One of them will represent your views on a service you use - education, NHS, transport. Pick one, and vote.

Being sanctimonious about the "power" of a spoilt ballot is SUCH a waste.

I can't put it any better. So what that poster said.
Spoiling a ballot paper seems like the ultimate insult to the suffragettes, frankly.

Don't patronise me about privilege @OrangeSlices998. I'm half Jewish so Corbyn (who indulges antisemitism) won't get my vote and even if I could hold my nose and vote Labour, my local candidate has a stupid position on a green local issue.
I won't vote Tory. Self ID idiocy means I won't vote Green or Lib Dem. Brexit Party can fuck off. Those are my choices.
When I lived in the Soviet Union, spoiling your ballot was an act of bravery. Privilege to choose between the unacceptable is no privilege.

And I've been voting since the mid 80s. I always vote. Never had this bollocks to choose from.

This is the weirdest election to spoil your vote for. It's not a choice between two vaguely right of centre parties that essentially both want the same things like it used to be. It's a vote between the fairly far right and the fairly far left (in UK politics terms anyway). Even if you don't like either of the parties, you must prefer the ethos of one side over the other. Or vote based on Brexit alone - Leave, remain, second referendum.

I'm in NI so will be voting tactically as ever to try and keep the DUP out, but if I was in England I'd be voting tactically against the Tories. I'd have to hold my nose to vote Lib Dem and as much as I admire the Labour manifesto I think it's got as much chance of working as a chocolate teapot. But I will stand up and be counted as a voice against our country's ongoing swing to the right.

Spoiling your ballot is a vote for the incumbent party in your area, imo. Most likely, it's a vote for the Tories. I could never forgive myself.

All the parties in England have lurched to the extreme.

@peachgreen , I generally vote Labour but Corbyn lets antisemites get away with shite.

If that 70% actually VOTED things might be really different

Precisely. But voter turnout is so low because none of the parties listen, and none of them give a shit about reforming democracy so it's actually democratic.

Massive marches against Brexit, almost everyone agreeing it was a flawed concept for a referendum brought about by stupid 'campaign election promises' Cameron, almost everyone who's sane agreeing it's ridiculous not to take it back to the country for another referendum ... and yet none of them have acted at all to protect our democracy, or that's how it appears. No wonder that so many are apathetic.

Fine, so I'll vote Lib Dem. At least they put their anti-Brexit message at the top of their manifesto. But the Lib Dems here, where I am, are wielding the same tired old schtick as they did in 2017, when (the same) candidate came 4th in the polls, with a woeful count below some independents, and with some frankly dodgy opinions.

Or maybe I'll vote Labour and increase the second place losing candidate's quota by 1. But that won't decrease the Tory majority here. It will just add my 1 vote to a candidate who's always going to lose.

People don't turn out to vote because they don't feel heard. It's pointless, they feel. If there was at least a mechanism by which people could say "I want to vote but not for any of you guys, sort this shit out", then maybe more people would exercise their democratic right. And then maybe politicians would have to try harder to actually hear the opinions of those people who want to vote but feel disenfranchised.

I mean yeah, it's unlikely. And I probably won't spoil my ballot, when it comes down to it. But I am in enormous sympathy with people who want to.