Have you/will you spoil your ballot?

[CervixSampler]

Today I have for the first time ever. I know I'll be flamed by some but the available choices don't know what a woman is. I had fun with my pencil but it sits uneasy with me.

I spoiled my constituency ballot. Spoiled ballots are counted - the count is read out too I believe. I wonder whether this election will see a significant increase in the number of spoiled ballots?

Along with various others, I stuck stickers on my ballot & in the booth. Planning to sticker in other places too such as public toilets.

I did not do this lightly.
I have never not voted.

You can buy stickers here:

https://www.standingforwomen.com/campaign-golas

I'm going to join The Friends of Lesbian Labour as soon as it's set up. They are taking email addresses right now. Just message them.

https://www.lesbianlabour.com

(Please don't vote Tory 🙏🙏🙏)

I spoiled my ballot. I could not in good conscience vote for any of the candidates.

For those saying "Could you not excuse the sexism/were there no other issues to vote on?" - if all the candidates were standing on a platform of racism, or homophobia, would you excuse it and vote for one of them? Would you expect a BME individual or a gay or lesbian individual to vote for one of those candidates, or would you consider it reasonable for them to spoil their ballot?

Apologies for comparing female oppression with the oppression of other groups, but female oppression is pervasively and insistently minimised. It is so accepted and normalised that it feels like sometimes the only way to get across the seriousness of sexism is to compare it with another oppression (one that affects men!)

@SassenachsWhaHae

I spoiled my constituency ballot. Spoiled ballots are counted - the count is read out too I believe. I wonder whether this election will see a significant increase in the number of spoiled ballots?

Yes, I wonder about the number of spoiled ballots. It was low in Hartlepool - maybe 150 or so.

If we eventually get to 25% of all ballots being spoiled, maybe politicians will start to pay attention.

I was also dismayed to see there were no independent candidates standing, but until (ha!) we shift to a PR system I guess standing as an independent is an exercise in losing money.

Yes, I wonder about the number of spoiled ballots. It was low in Hartlepool - maybe 150 or so.

There were 16 candidates - many standing on specific issue/protest platforms, so providing outlets for voters who were “none of the above” for the main parties. Also - the Hartlepool by-election is the only election today that actually is explicitly about whether those voters are pro/anti Boris Johnson’s govt. I’d be a lot, lot less likely to spoil my ballot if I’d voted there. I may even have supported the Labour candidate depending on his individual behaviour/position. So much about the tactics of how you vote for depend on where you are voting and what you are voting for (MP, council, regional, devolved parliament, city mayor etc).

Agreed @BigHuff !!

Sexism is so engrained isn't it? People don't even see it sometimes.

Is there actually a formal record anywhere of the number of spoiled ballots? In all the counts shown on the news they just read the number who voted for each candidate. Do they not record the number of spoiled ballots anywhere?

I expect that somewhere there is a record of the number of spoilt ballots overall.

Of course spoilt ballot papers are counted - all the papers are counted. That doesn't mean they count for anything.

I can't find a precise figure for the 2019 election but here's some hyperbolic headlines for you. Then note the actual figure- 3363 out of the whole of South West London. This is 20 constituencies. The average constituency is 72,200 so if only 50% voted then out of 722,000 people 3,363 spoiled their vote. That’s 0.4%

Spoiled ballots soared by almost a third from the 2017 General Election in south west London

Constituencies recorded a 32% surge in rejected ballot papers at last week’s election, with 2,552 in 2017 rising to 3,363 in 2019

I spoilt mine for the first time.
I tried to be very careful about what I wrote (almost certainly unnecessary overthinking) because I did not want it to be misconstrued as a personal adhominem attack on one of the candidates (who is a transwoman).

I absolutely have nothing against her personally: My concerns are about sex based rights and the freedom to raise those concerns and tell the truth without the fear of destroyed livelihoods and careers, death threats and rape threats and all the other "consequences" some women have suffered for speaking out.

However I did worry that writing "woman = adult human female" could be misconstrued as against that candidate personally. Possibly even drawing a penis could be interpreted that way!

Probably I was overthinking it...

My area has just announced who won the constituency vote and the newspaper article announcing this mentioned the number of spoilt ballots. It's just less than 200.

I spoilt my paper - with some very clear statements. It is a very safe Labour seat so I didn't expect it to make a difference or be seen/read. However, all votes now in for the Council and one seat went down to the wire and went to Tories by one vote. I would think all spoilt papers were viewed and discussed very carefully. The candidate would likely have a pretty good idea why they lost.

I'd like to know how many spoilt ballots there were. How can I find out that information?

Labour need a total revamp.

Look for the election results on the council’s own website. (Assuming council election.)

19 spoilt in my area, 14 where I was before. But these are wards with about 3500 cast so it puts it in perspective slightly. I suppose the advantage of such low numbers is that there is a chance each spoilt paper stands out more.

Huge number of spoilt ballots in the London Mayoral election by the sound of things, but that seems to be down to poor ballot design rather than postal votes. It seems "put a cross against your first choice in column A and against your second choice in column B" becomes less of a clear instruction when there are two columns of candidates on the ballot and column A and B are marked in much smaller print than the candidate names.

Tbh, round our way our knobhead party leader Tony gets votes and then just ignores the voters anyway until, well I'd like to say until the next election but they don't even have to put that much effort in, being from the party that's going to win anyway, so it's ignoring forever. At least a spoilt ballot shows lack of support.

Where's my quotes post gone? 🙄

I spoilt mine for the first time ever. No one thinks that the counting clerks are going to read every message (if one was even written on a spoilt vote) but the actual number is spoiled votes is counted. So I gave them something to count!

And it's not just that I spoiled my ballot. I told people around me about it. My family. DP's huge family. Friends. No window poster, no endorsement, nothing.

All my lot abstained.

The candidate we'd have most likely voted for lost by a handful of votes. It was really, really close.

Have just looked up the figures for Leeds. Shows lists of candidates for each ward, size of voting population and votes cast as a . The numbers of spoiled votes were between 30 and in some cases 70 plus. Some of the votes were close so I imagine that those would have been looked at at least . Surprised the numbers weren’t higher .

Meanwhile in the Scottish Parliamentary elections, turnout was very high but they reckon that 140000 were spoiled votes. Maybe due to confusion about the system used, or maybe something else.

Childish nonsense.