Aimee Knight (née Challenor, born 1 October 1997) is a British transgender activist, former spokesperson and electoral candidate for the Green Party,[2] and former Reddit administrator.[3] In 2017, she stood for election in Coventry South, receiving 1.3% of the votes.
In 2018, Knight's father, who had been serving as her election agent, was convicted and jailed for raping and torturing a 10-year-old girl, and for making indecent images of children.[4][5] Knight's recruitment of her father, despite her knowledge of the charges for 22 sexual offences, led to an investigation and Knight's suspension from the Green Party. She later resigned and joined the Liberal Democrats, but was suspended in 2019 over paedophilic tweets apparently posted by her partner.[6][7][8][9] Knight resigned from Stonewall UK at around the same time, leaving the United Kingdom for the United States.
In March 2021, Knight became a topic of contention on Reddit, causing several sub-communities to protest her employment by the company. This resulted, in a matter of hours, in an official statement by the website's administrators being released – in which Reddit confirmed that it had not properly vetted Knight before hiring her and that she was no longer employed by the company.[10]
Although assigned male at birth, Knight said she realised she was a girl around the age of 10, but her parents were unaware of the existence of trans people.[11] Knight and her two younger siblings were taken into care in 2013.[12][13] Knight came out as trans in 2014; her older sibling is also a transgender woman.[14]
When she was 15, Knight was arrested over claims she threatened to crash the Bullring shopping centre website. This led to police raiding the family home. No charges were laid and the case was later dropped.[22]
During 2019, Knight went through the process of changing her legal gender through the Gender Recognition Act 2004 and the British government issued a new birth certificate recognising her as female.[23]
She married Nathaniel Knight, an American, in December 2019.[24]
In July 2017, Knight was the Green candidate for Coventry South. She received 1.3% of the vote share, with 604 votes.[29] Knight stood for Coventry City Council elections as a member of the Green Party in February 2016[30] and May 2016.[31] She stood in a May 2018 local election and was not elected.
Knight stood in the 2018 party election to be deputy leader, which closed at the end of August.
In August 2018, Knight's father David Challenor was sentenced to 22 years in prison for raping and torturing a 10-year-old girl in the attic of the home shared by him, his wife Tina Challenor, and Knight.[12][4][5] Knight's father had been reported to the police in 2015 and charged in November 2016. Following this, Knight chose her father as her election agent for the 2017 general election and also the 2018 council elections. Knight had given her father's name as "Baloo Challenor" on campaign materials, later commenting that he was known locally by this nickname.[12] After her father's sentencing, Knight – who insisted she did not know the allegations against her father in full – stood down from the Green Party's deputy leadership election.[12][13][32]
David Challenor became a member of the Green Party in December 2015 when Knight gifted him a membership. In November 2016, Knight informed party coordinators by Facebook messenger that he had been charged with the sexual offences. She did not disclose these charges in writing, as is required, when she signed up as a party candidate in 2017 and 2018.[33][34] When her father was convicted and sentenced in August 2018, he was expelled from the party with immediate effect. Correspondingly, Knight and her mother Tina, were both suspended from the party pending an inquiry, with Knight resigning before the associated disciplinary process got underway.[33][34]
Knight was consequently suspended from the party on a no-fault basis, and the party launched an inquest into possible safeguarding failures as her father was allowed to act as her election agent after having been charged.[35][36] In September 2018, Knight resigned from the Green Party citing transphobia;[37] however, Knight continued to cooperate with the inquest. The inquest by Verita found in January 2019 that she had committed a "serious error of judgement" in appointing her father as her campaign manager.[38][39] The report also said that the Green Party, who were told by Knight that her father had been arrested but not that he was a party member, could have done more to investigate the matter.[40][34]
Liberal Democrats
In October 2018, she joined the Liberal Democrats, becoming the Diversity Officer of her local party.[41][42][43] She was suspended from the Liberal Democrats in July 2019, after tweets appeared on her partner's account admitting to having sexual fantasies involving sex with children. One of the tweets by Nathaniel Knight's account read: "I fantasise about children having sex, sometimes with adults, sometimes with other children, sometimes kidnapped and forced into bad situations."[6][7][8][9] Knight later claimed that her partner's account had been hacked.[8]
Reddit
After working as an unpaid moderator, then as a contractor for the Reddit Public Access Network, Knight was hired as an administrator by Reddit.[44] In March 2021, Reddit banned a subreddit moderator for sharing a Spectator article which mentioned Knight, and some users alleged that Reddit was removing all mention of Knight and banning users who mentioned her. A large number of subreddits, including r/Music which had 27 million subscribers, and 19 other subreddits with over one million subscribers, went private in protest of the bans and the hiring of Knight despite her connections to David Challenor and Nathaniel Knight.[45][46][44][47] On 24 March, Reddit's CEO Steve Huffman said that Knight had been inadequately vetted before being hired and that Knight was no longer employed at the company. Huffman also stated that Reddit would review its relevant internal processes and attributed user suspensions to over-indexing on anti-harassment measures.[44][10]
LGBT activism
In 2015, Knight was the LGBTQ Officer for Henley College Coventry; she protested the college's censoring of websites such as Birmingham Pride, which were considered "Gay or Lesbian or Bisexual Interest" by the college web blocker.[20][21] Knight was an organiser of Coventry Pride in 2016 and 2017.[48][49][50]
In May 2018, BBC News published an article that quoted writer Miranda Yardley describing Knight as a "man". Knight said that the BBC did not contact her about the article before its publication, though following readers' complaints she was asked to comment, and her response was added to the article.[53][54]
Knight was a member of the Trans Advisory Group for Stonewall, Britain's largest LGBT charity. She resigned in the summer of 2019 stating there was a "hostile environment towards trans people in the UK" and that she was concerned for her mental health and safety.[55][56]