It’s election year, and at every turn someone seems to be asking me whether or not I’m registered to vote and telling me how important it is that I should be. I must have had three e-mails in the last week about it; flyers sent to my pigeon hole; even in the History Faculty Café I couldn’t escape the flyer-waving army. The whole episode reminds me of discussions in the canteen at my sixth form, when people were so excited that we could all vote for the first time in the European elections. My staunchly Labour friend was in her element, launching all-out attacks on anyone who wasn’t adamant that they were going to vote Labour. As for those who weren’t voting, cries of "people died for your vote" echoed through the corridors, as if this age-old argument would force them to realise how morally reprehensible they were being, and repent their sins.

As a historian, I must say the notion that the past somehow confers obligations upon those living in the present is a strange concept; and one which frankly exaggerates historical reality to make a glib political point. That aside, I’ve always thought that people who make such arguments miss the fundamental point of what it was that people fought and indeed died for. It is true that people struggled for political enfranchisement, but that is more than simply putting a cross on a piece of paper in a polling station – it is the means of possessing a political voice and hence a source of political expression.

In that case, either through apathy, indecision or disillusionment, a refusal to vote is as valid a means of political expression as any other. The ability to vote does not shackle us to the ballot box; it gives us the opportunity to engage in the political culture of our country. At no point in that relationship is there some mandatory requirement for active political expression, and indeed a refusal to engage is equally appropriate – a fact which Russell Brand continuously tries to emphasise as he fashions himself as the love-child of Che Guevara and Adam Ant, who is yet to learn how to do up a shirt.

As Russell Brand becomes increasingly prevalent on Question Time and other political broadcasts, he rapidly appears to be becoming a political force in his own right – one that takes its manifesto from his recent book Revolution. We need not kid ourselves about this ‘revolution’, however. Not voting is not somehow a vote for some Utopian future in which all are free, equal, have long hair and beards and there has been a systematic campaign to remove all top buttons from shirts everywhere; rather it is to deprive oneself of a political voice. No revolution was ever achieved by inactivity.

The government won’t cease to function if voter turnout drops; it will simply represent a far narrower spectrum of political opinion. After every election I can remember there has always been at least some coverage of how voter turnout has been at a record low; or at least not far from it. I don’t see trouble in the Commons because whole constituencies didn’t turn out to elect the MPs present, and although David Cameron will no doubt make numerous statements about how it is necessary to raise political awareness, the coalition doesn’t actually seem to be doing that much to make a difference. In essence, not voting does not send the government some potent message – a warning shot across the bow of the ‘revolution’ that’s to come – you simply fail to engage in politics.

Now that’s fine – this article isn’t some covert auxiliary to the leaflet army, and a refusal to vote is as valid a form of political expression as any other; but it is a political expression defined by a lack of it. If we as a society want political change – be that a true revolutionary change in regime or simply a reform of rhetoric to make politics more accessible – then we need to understand that we have to make it happen. Simply opting out of the system will have no effect unless there is a rise of some quasi-Bolshevik alternative to take its place. Given that that is unlikely, a refusal to engage with the system is to have no influence over it. Nothing will happen if we grumble and moan, while we sit by and watch a television personality drape himself over sofas in newsrooms and show the world that he ate a thesaurus with his breakfast. I think it’s about time that we woke up, galvanised ourselves and actually decided what it is that we really want.