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Requests for comment/Severe Problems in hewiki/Selective Enforcement

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Chapter 2.4 - Selective Enforcement

Selective enforcement is expressed when different treatment is applied upon different editors who perform similar actions. It seems that the bureaucrats and admins give preferential treatment to conservative and religious editors who are close to them, while at the same time they are being strict, sometimes even to the point of persecution, with liberal editors who have been marked by them.

2.4.1 Etiquette Enforcement

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There is a clear pattern of discriminatory enforcement between conservative vs. liberal editors. Conservative editors often face minimal consequences, if any, for etiquette violations, while liberal editors face harsh penalties for similar or lesser infractions. Namely, many occasions of hostile behavior by nationalist/religious editors were overlooked, while similar or milder statements from liberal editors led to blocks. Listed below are a few examples, starting with the former type. All the editors appearing in the first list of examples below are religious/nationalists, as implied by their user pages and/or the positions they present in the talk pages.

  • Bora Bora :
    • mocking editors who oppose him, while suggesting that they are part of a hypothetical left-winged "cruiser" which biases articles.
    • adding a human rights activist to a category of "Convicted in Bodily Harm". This was a false accusation (and indeed was deleted by another user within an hour).
    • accusing users with initiating polls on a Saturday "as a dirty trick aimed to gain momentum".
    • Bora-Bora was eventually blocked for one month as a result of his ongoing mocking of other editors and many etiquette violations. note the bureaucrat's message to him: "this block came after many warnings over the course of three months... other editors would have been blocked for good for your actions".
  • Shmey Rabah:
    • mocking an editor's eyesight because she wrote she couldn't see any good argument in the discussion.
    • His offensive responses in discussions are sometimes deleted by admins, but never bare any sanctions (for example here).
    • Shmey Rabah was never blocked, except upon his own request in days of prayer.
  • Mr. Nostalgia (an orthodox editor with nationalistic views, as can be read on his personal user page):
    • "Crying and wailing won't help, and except for a handful of whiners who are still stuck from a week ago, the community has moved on" here
    • "This is a discussion madam, if you're not comfortable with it, don't participate in it" here
    • "Don't expect someone who doesn't bother to write articles to know how to formulate a title" here
    • Mr. Nostalgia was blocked 5 times, mostly for short periods, and in most cases his block was cancelled early, long before it expired. here. He still continues with his mocking style, especially towards female editors, usually without any sanction.
  • Eyal:
    • "Do you really think that phrasings like 'I agree with...' contribute to the discussion? They are ridiculous and boldly declare - a recruitment has been organized!" here,
    • "Let's turn Wikipedia into Twitter, let's go back to tedious discussions about what some minister said and the tail-wagging of another" (His response was deleted by admins because it was offensive, alas without any sanction) here
    • "The choir continues to persecute and incite" here
    • Eyal has never been blocked except once for twenty minutes, or at his own request here
  • AddMore-III:
    • "A swarm of secular editors can burst into the discussion page and force changes from my version of the article just because of majority votes" here
    • "The mountains of nonsense in the discussion page" here
    • After he suggested to mark "political editors", a user kindly asked him how he would define a political editor. He replied "Don't bother me on my talk page with your annoying questions" here.
    • Here is a user's address to AddMore-III, describing four events in which he broke the code of conduct, assumed bad faith, lied about reaching a consensus in the talk page and erased messages from talk pages. Another user testifies that AddMore regularly uses "Lies, defamation, slander about other editors (including personal persecution), editorial wars, taking over values, biasing values ​​based on a religious-political agenda, and more". AddMore never bothered to reply.
    • AddMore was blocked only once, for one day, for exposing personal details of a user. He was never blocked for his offensive language, lies on talk pages and edit summaries, erasing messages, assumption of bad faith etc.
  • Yaakov:
    • "The bureaucrats need to decide whether to let you and your gang turn Wikipedia into a propaganda site for the Kaplan gang" (In the expression 'Kaplan gang' he is alluding to the pro-democracy weekly protests that take place at Kaplan Junction in Tel Aviv) here
    • "The leftist recruitment that was done according to all Wikipedia rules behind the scenes" here
    • Wrote offensive text that was later deleted by admins, and admitted that he was approached by the Bureaucrats and was asked not to organize recruitments (but he did not receive any sanctions for it) here
  • Neriah:
    • In one of the discussions in the Village Pump, he wrote "After deliberation between several editors, we decided to propose defining a comprehensive definition for a political article through a parliament vote" here. Since the consultation he referred to was not done over Wikipedia pages, and it is presumably an agreement between several editors to vote in favor of a specific policy, it is similar in nature to claims about "influence networks" for which many liberal editors were permanently blocked (see chapter 2.1.1 Mass Blocking), but no sanctions were taken against him.


In contrast, liberal editors received blocks for relatively minor infractions. for example:

  • Ima Shel:: A two-month block without any clear explanation, just a general statement without any link to a specific edit, and with no prior warning. here
  • Hila Livne: Was blocked for a pain-filled comment she wrote in response to an offensive comment from an editor. The editor's offensive comment was "I laughed so hard I suspected I might have urinary incontinence" in reference to a statement saying one of the leaders of the pro-democracy protest did not call for military service refusal (a sensitive issue in Israeli society). He was never sanctioned for his offensive comment, but she was blocked for a week for her response ("Please disclose where you served in the army and for how long. It's insolent to mock someone who sacrificed years of their life in combat and lost their best friends before their eyes. I'm talking about what's happening on social networks around this issue under the auspices of the poison machine.")
  • A one-week block of three liberal editors (IthamarEshpar, Imashel and sofiblum) without any reason, just to 'balance' the blocking of a conservative editor here
  • sofiblum was blocked from all hewiki pages for not finding a mentor within 10 days, even though there is no such regulation, and while other editors in the same situation were not blocked.
  • Many liberal editors where blocked or sanctioned otherwise without even understanding the reason for the block/sanction, as elaborated above in chapter 2.1.

This demonstrates a clear bias in enforcement of behavioral standards. There are many more examples, which can be provided on demand.

2.4.2 Administrator and Reviewer Permissions

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The bureaucrats granted permissions to editors close to them and prevented permissions from liberal editors or editors who expressed criticism about their actions, even if they received broad community support:

  • Axino - received very broad support but then some conservative editors accused him of making political decisions and being too left-wing. The bureaucrats decided to not appoint him despite 73% support plus 11% support for trial period. Their argument was basically that he "jumps to conclusions on an irrelevant basis" and "lack of proper judgement" - but without showing specific events in which it supposedly happened.
  • Danny Gershoni - received broad community support, but then some conservative editors claimed that he had no prior experience in patrolling. There is no rule requiring an administrator to have patrolling experience, he was asked by the bureaucrats to patrol for several months before receiving administrator permissions. Even after patrolling for several months and reaching second place in the patrollers' ranking, and even after the bureaucrats were reminded by editors that they had committed to granting him the permission, the permission was not given to him. Eventually he was blocked indefinitely with the accusation of undisclosed payed editing.
  • Gabi S. - put himself forward for the administrator position, was attacked in the discussion for having liberal views, advised to withdraw because of his liberal views ("you don't need this") and withdrew his candidacy as a result.
  • idoc07 - received over 85% support, but it was claimed he was too young and not mature enough for the role. Idoc09 has expressed criticism of the bureaucrats mass blocks and change of rules several times, which might be related to the denial of adminship.

2.4.3 One Sided Restrictions on "Political Editing"

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Liberal editors often face sanctions for "current events/political editing" while conservative editors demonstrate similar activities without any consequence. Examples include imposing of mandatory mentorship and threatening with block, while conservative editors freely edit current events articles.

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