BREAKING: Aimee Challenor fired from Reddit following widespread user protest

From u/spez:

“We would like to give you all an update on the recent issues that have transpired concerning a specific Reddit employee, as well as provide you with context into actions that we took to prevent doxxing and harassment.

As of today, the employee in question is no longer employed by Reddit. We built a relationship with her first as a mod and then through her contractor work on RPAN. We did not adequately vet her background before formally hiring her.”

Hundreds of subreddits today went private over the issue. Why? The August 2018 Spectator article about Aimee Challenor sheds light on this person’s background. Challenor became a Green Party candidate, a member of Stonewall’s Trans Advisory Group, and leader of something called Coventry Pride.

Sounds good, yeah? Well then the family drama struck:

"That inexorable upward trajectory has come to an unfortunate halt with Aimee’s withdrawal from the deputy leadership contest because of his father’s conviction for the rape and torture of a 10-year-old child in the family’s attic. Unfortunately, even after her father's arrest, Aimee made the baffling decision to nominate him as her election agent. Her father's previous record was such that not only his children but the family pets were removed from him at one point."

Challenor, a gender non-conforming biological male who identifies as transgender and uses "they/them" pronouns, responded by saying they made their father an election agent as a means of trying to forgive him. Challenor denied knowledge of their father’s past wrongdoings. “I did not go into the attic during my adult life – it was considered 'dad’s space'.”

This led to a “Terfblocker” internet campaign where people were blocked en masse for denying Aimee’s claimed gender.

When Challenor stepped down as equalities spokesperson for the Green Party, that was presumably the end of it (the Party was not properly informed about Challenor's father’s charges).

In 2019 the Liberal Democrat party suspended Aimee Challenor when it was revealed that Challenor's husband admitted to having sexual fantasies about children. "I fantasize about children having sex, sometimes with adults, sometimes with other children, sometimes kidnapped and forced into bad situations, sometimes coerced through fantasy mind control."

Fast forward to the other day, however, and Reddit comes in. A UK politics subreddit moderator had to come out and explain why they had to go private the night before. A moderator posted an article that mentioned Aimee Challenor in passing and was permanently suspended for it. r/ukpolitics contacted Reddit admins and found out the site had hired Aimee Challenor. They also found out that the admins are banning anyone from mentioning Aimee’s past on the grounds of harassment.

Previously the Reddit Admins issued this response. Which includes an allegation of posting “personal information” that r/ukpolitics strongly denies.

“Earlier this month, a Reddit employee was the target of harassment and doxxing (sharing of personal or confidential information). Reddit activated standard processes to protect the employee from such harassment, including initiating an automated moderation rule to prevent personal information from being shared. The moderation rule was too broad, and this week it incorrectly suspended a moderator who posted content that included personal information. After investigating the situation, we reinstated the moderator the same day. We are continuing to review all the details of the situation to ensure that we protect users and employees from doxxing -- including those who may have a public profile -- without mistakenly taking action on non-violating content.”

Thus the current standoff where hundreds of subreddits are going private in protest of this debacle.