Advice on spoiling ballot

[JellySlice]

I'm firmly in favour of Remain.
I am also firmly Gender Critical.

Not only is there nobody I can vote for, but, as I am also in a firmly Conservative constituency, there is hardly any point in voting!

Is there a way to spoil my ballot that clearly demonstrates my inability to exercise my democratic rights?

I know from personal experience of being at a number of vote counts that spoiled ballot papers are indeed read by party workers who are there all night watching the count and sometimes the candidates themselves, so it is worth writing the precise reason you are not voting for any of them.

If it were up to me, every feminist in a marginal seat would vote tactically to get or keep the Tories out and everyone in a safe seat would spoil their ballot paper - unless they've had positive confirmation from their MP that they are opposed to gender self-ID and are fighting for us within their party. I'm in a safe Labour seat so in the local council elections I and a few others I know of wrote 'No to Gender Self-ID Labour losing women' to show I was a lost vote for Labour.

I'm not spoiling my ballot under the illusion that someone will read it any undergo a gender critical epiphany

The decision to spoil is not about a last ditch appeal to anyone, but an act of integrity when confronted with no other option.

I spoilt my ballot for the European elections photo on this thread and although I feel really strongly about Brexit I cannot bring myself to vote for the Lib Dems this time round so, with a heavy heart, will be getting my purple and green sharpies out again.

That's fabulous MrsFogi

@MrsFogi

I love it, I'm gonna join you. This weekend will be spent in the pursuit of green and purple sharpie.

Generally, I would avoid spoiling a ballot, in honour of the women who got us the vote.

They got us the right to spoil our ballots too! A woman can't spoil a ballot if she's not even given one because women can't vote in her country. The right to vote iincludes the right to spoil your ballot.

Vote, vote, vote!!!!

@wallowinwater who the fuck for????

find a local mp and turn the tide on there thinking

You don't have "a local MP" from a choice of several (as implied by the instruction "find a local MP" instead of "find your MP, as if MPs are like GP surgeries), you have one: your constituency MP. If your one MP is Dawn Butler, or a LibDem, or any of the other overt misogynists, you're not going to change the tide on them.

Spoiling your ballot is the last resort for the ethical voter faced with unethical candidates.

Vote, vote, vote!!!!

Do you have anything constructive to add to this, because repeating an imperative three times isn't constructive.

Spoiling your ballot is the last resort for the ethical voter faced with unethical candidates.

Agree. I really, really really don't want to spoil my ballot.

SO - I found out today that one of the candidates standing in my constituency is a general all round "good egg". I don't know their feelings on gender self ID (yet) - but thoughts on voting for him?

He will not get in. He just won't. The conservatives will get in. I'm in Sevenoaks constituency. He's labour.

Any thoughts?

there's nothing essentially wrong about saying you think Brexit is more important than this issue - if that is the case. But Please be aware that for many it is not.

I will be (probably hopelessly) voting against the Tories. Not because I believe brexit is 'more important', but because I believe that my vote could potentially have an impact on Brexit, whereas it can't be used to protect women's rights at this election (as the right wing have never been about women and the left wing have all drunk the trans kool aid).

It does feel like trying to put out the shed fire, while the whole house is also burning, but I think I stand a minor chance with the shed, and if it worked I'd have something rather than standing by and watching everything burn.

I will continue to try to fight for women on other fronts where I might have an impact, but this election is not that for me.

Seriously, do some of you not care about anything else happening in our country, other than trans issues?

It's like evangelical Christians in the US voting for Trump even though he's despicable, simply because Abortion. Single issue politics simply shows how blinkered people can be.

The NHS, education, social care, the economy....good grief, there are any number of things that affect every single person in this country, but you'd rather spoil a vote because of shared toilets.

Sara, I'm sorry because I'm a bit out of patience tonight, but can I just say fuck off with your minimising shit. Either piss off and do the research so that you understand why this is so important to some of us, or just piss off full stop. Buy don't you dare lecture me about not caring about anything else. I care about a whole load of things, but I have made the decision that I care about women and girls most.

sara, I'm afraid I'm having a really hard time voting for a party that will extinguish women's rights. You realise that's what gender self iD will do?

Yeah saraclara, it's all about bogs 🙄

None of you lecturing us realise, if women dont exist then Brexit, NHS, education, sports etc do not matter. Because only men will be deciding everything.

I usually just draw a big penis and write the Susan B Anthony quote along the shaft:

No self-respecting woman should wish or work for the success of a party who ignores her sex.

saraclara you'd rather spoil a vote because of shared toilets.

A while back, I wrote about being scared to phone Rape Crisis in case a male voice answered. AS me if you don't believe me, I can't be bothered to hunt down the thread right now. We have lesbians pressured into sex with penis-having transwomen. We have males competing in female sports. We have males in female prisons sexually assaulting the female prisoners. There are two support threads on here for women (Detroit and Childrenandhomeless) who are homeless because they can't face a DV shelter with males in it. Detroit was living in a tent last time I checked.

When you describe our concerns as being about "shared toilets", you lie and you libel us. Debate in good faith, truthfully and without defamation, or get lost.

FFS you'd think the TPAs and their handmaids would have got the message by now: every time they come on here to berate and defame us by claiming our motive to be "toilet panic", a bunch of us will step up and say "actually it's this list of really important issues as well", giving us a chance to remind any lurkers or casual visitors that we are fighting to defend women's rights, services, and spaces that we need because our oppression is based on our reproductive biology.

you lie and you libel us

Yes! And need to be said more!

We are talking about women LOSING their legal protections under the Equality Act. Because that is what will happen if males can claim them too by identifying as women. All our hard won rights - gone in a puff of of rainbow coloured smoke.

No self-respecting woman should wish or work for the success of a party who ignores her sex, much less vote for that party.

Self-respecting women can and should spoil their ballots if there is no party that acknowledges her sex. We betray the suffragettes who won us the vote if we misuse it for a party that "ignores our sex".

I'm sick and tired of being told that I have a responsibility to vote; women fought for the right to vote, there are countries around the world which don't allow Democracy etc etc. It's so fucking patronising, and dogmatic.
As if an intelligent middle aged woman had not considered those points.

If it were up to me, every feminist in a marginal seat would vote tactically to get or keep the Tories out and everyone in a safe seat would spoil their ballot paper - unless they've had positive confirmation from their MP that they are opposed to gender self-ID and are fighting for us within their party.

This is really good advice.

It will make no difference at all in my constituency whether I vote for a main party candidate, vote for a local independent, monster raving looney etc., spoil my ballot or just don't turn up at all. My constituency will return a Labour MP with a huge margin, as they have done since the middle of the last century. The brexit vote here was hugely in favour of remain so even though lots of constituencies that were previously safe might not be this time, mine is not one of them.

If I lived somewhere more marginal then I would obviously have more factors to weigh up. But I don't so I will be spoiling my ballot as I have done the last three times.

Some people seem very invested in guilting us all into putting an X next to the name of one craven shit or another, regardless of local circumstances.

You’d need to write about 5 words in a sharpie

Something like:

WOMAN = ADULT HUMAN FEMALE

?

I can care and get angry about more than one thing at once. It seems that most people here can't. If it's not trans rights being a threat to women, it's not important, apparently.

(And you'll note that I've not expressed an opinion about trans rights being a threat to women. Yet people have assumed that because I'm not prepared to spoil a vote that could be used to fight cuts to the NHS, social care and education, I can't possibly care about women's rights too)

sarclara - you are being disingenuous there - in the face of many women agonising about this.

Yes we care about more than one thing at a time - but completely relinquishing women's rights - don't you think that's a bit of a big ask??