If possible I prefer voting for a small party / candidate even if they have no chance at winning. That way it actually takes away votes from the big options, while blanks are just ignored in the reported results. At least that’s how it works here, the first thing ignored are the non-voters, next invalid / blank votes, and the only thing that matters and gets reported on are valid votes.
I think blank votes are ignored because there are so few of them.
If an election is getting 10 or 20% blank votes, that’s hard to ignore because it means a huge fraction of actually engaged and active voters - who could’ve just as easilly put a cross somewhere - aren’t being served.
Amongst other things it tells existing parties that “my vote is here for the taking”.
If possible I prefer voting for a small party / candidate even if they have no chance at winning. That way it actually takes away votes from the big options, while blanks are just ignored in the reported results. At least that’s how it works here, the first thing ignored are the non-voters, next invalid / blank votes, and the only thing that matters and gets reported on are valid votes.
I think blank votes are ignored because there are so few of them.
If an election is getting 10 or 20% blank votes, that’s hard to ignore because it means a huge fraction of actually engaged and active voters - who could’ve just as easilly put a cross somewhere - aren’t being served.
Amongst other things it tells existing parties that “my vote is here for the taking”.