You may have seen coverage of the Polari Prize protest, in which almost all of the first book prize nominees and many of the main prize nominees have withdrawn in protest at the inclusion of the anti-trans writer John Boyne.

Boyne, a self-proclaimed “TERF” who just happened to sanitise his social media a few days before his inclusion was announced, is well known for being anti-trans (and anti-other parts of the LGBTQ+ community and their supporters). Just days ago in a newspaper interview he compared women supportive of trans rights to the character from The Handmaid’s Tale who is “ready to pin a handmaiden down as her husband rapes her.”

This is the same Boyne who had a very public fight with the Auschwitz-Birkenau Holocaust memorial museum, which said that his book The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas “should be avoided by anyone who studies or teaches the history of the Holocaust” because the book is based on “historical inaccuracies and stereotypical portrayals of major characters that help to perpetuate dangerous myths about the Holocaust”. He brought the same rigour to his more recent book about a trans child, a book whose message could best be described as “trans bad. Don’t be trans.” The criticism of that book sent him down the anti-trans rabbit hole he was already leaning into.

Including him in a prize supposedly celebrating the entire LGBTQ+ community is rather like nominating Andrew Tate for a feminist award – and his response to the protest makes that clear. His response uses the tactic favoured by abusers, DARVO – deny, attack, reverse victim and offender – to try and paint himself as an innocent little boy besieged by sinister forces, and he doubles down by saying that if a minority’s human rights are perceived to conflict with those of the majority, the minority’s rights don’t matter. For anyone to say that is incredible. For a gay man to say it is indefensible.

In all the coverage of the protests not one of the authors or judges who withdrew, or the hundreds of writers and publishing workers who have signed a letter protesting Boyne’s inclusion, has been given the opportunity to comment. Instead, Boyne and his beloved JK Rowling are getting all the column inches with lurid claims of what the Telegraph describes as being “cancelled” by “trans zealots”.

The people who are protesting are doing so because they’re principled, and pulling out of the prize means sacrificing a potentially significant boost in sales. They are not bigots or bullies and they are not cancelling anyone. They are the ones whose voices are being silenced.