Talk:The case against Gwen Gale

"I will kill myself tonight and it is all your fault." wrote 16-years old kid at the talk page of Wikipedia administrator Gwen Gale on February 3,2012. This kid, as many other Wikipedia users has became a victim of bullying that is allowed on the site that belongs to non-profit charitable organization tax-exempt organization Wikimedia Foundation

Gwen Gale is not the only bully administrator on Wikipedia. She's probably not the worst either. She's one of dozens bullies that allow to roam free in Wikipedia's jungles.


Although the name of the article is The case against Gwen Gale this article could have been named "the case against bullying on Wikipedia".

Below is a real request concerning Gwen Gale. This request was filed on one of Wikipedia sites, and it was deleted with no action taken. Read it and decide for yourself.

The case against Gwen Gale

Some examples of unwarranted blocks and unwarranted removing of talk page access









  • User Super Badnik was blocked indefinitely at 21:03, 9 August 2008. The block was overturned by another administrator.


  • User Breathing Dead at 20:51, 23 July 2009 Gwen removed his talk page access. The talk page access was restored by another administrator.



  • User Mbz1

On December 23, 2010 Gwen Gale responded to canvassing and blocked the editor for a week. She made the block to be indefinite after the editor made this post. She removed the editor's talk page access without warning only because the editor added an indefinite blocked user template to her talk page two times. The talk page access was restored by another administrator.


  • user Ogioh was blocked indefinitely. The block was reverted in less than an hour.



Gwen Gale misusing her administrative tools when involved

The policy that clearly states:

In general, editors should not act as administrators in cases in which they have been involved. This is because involved administrators may have, or may be seen as having, a conflict of interest in disputes they have been a party to or have strong feelings about. Involvement is generally construed very broadly by the community, to include current or past conflicts with an editor (or editors), and disputes on topics, regardless of the nature, age, or outcome of the dispute.

This section states:

Conflict of interest, non-neutrality, or content dispute – Administrators should not use their tools to advantage, or in a content dispute (or article) where they are a party (or significant editor), or where a significant conflict of interest is likely to exist. With few specific exceptions (like obvious vandalism) where tool use is allowed by any admin, administrators should ensure they are reasonably neutral parties when they use the tools.


In this thread Gwen Gale stated:"First, if you are an admin and get involved in a content dispute like this, you cannot use your admin powers to resolve it." It was said on May 16, 2008.


Administrator Magog the Ogre Magog the Ogre had this to say about Gwen's conduct:
Gwen is very very much out of line, not only with the rollback tool but threatening to block a user in a dispute: future edit warring of this type will receive a block.
After Gwen Gale yet another time claimed a good faith edit to be "vandalism" administrator HJ Mitchell had this to say about Gwen's conduct:
In this case, while it might not have been your intention to get into a dispute, you did step over the bright-line rule and, as far as I can see, none of the reverted edits were vandalism. I would suggest being more careful with rollback at the very least. Non-admins have been known to lose it for less. In this case, while it might not have been your intention to get into a dispute, you did step over the bright-line rule and, as far as I can see, none of the reverted edits were vandalism. I would suggest being more careful with rollback at the very least. Non-admins have been known to lose it for less.
Gwen also received a personal message about this incident.
3RR violation + misuse of admin tools. Please see WP:AN3#User:Gwen Gale reported by User:John J. Bulten (Result: protected). I am also rescinding the warning you gave the user you were opposed to, and replacing it with a proper warning for edit warring. Please consider this a warning: if you believe it is inappropriate and/or would like to appeal it, you may take it to WP:ANI. Magog the Ogre (talk) 00:17, 2 October 2010 (UTC)










  • This comment was made by Gwen in a section of arbitration enforcement request concerning Mbz1 on April 5, 2011 . The problem with this comment is that it was made in the section that is clearly marked as "This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above." "Uninvolved administrator" means an administrator, who never edits content of the articles that belongs to the topic of the specific sanctions. Gwen Gale have been editing these articles for years. She was edit warring and pushing her point of view in these articles. I have never seen any other admin who made even small edits in the articles under ARBPIA commenting in the section for uninvolved administrators. Most of the times the really uninvolved administrators even will not revert either clear vandalism violations.


Biting newbies

In a paywalled article for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Timothy Messer-Kruse, a professor at Bowling Green State university specialising in the history of the American labor movement, detailed his frustrated encounters with Wikipedia's immune system in endeavouring to set perceived inaccuracies in its historical coverage to rights.

In the article named "The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia" the professor writes: "Explain to me, then, how a 'minority' source with facts on its side would ever appear against a wrong 'majority' one?" I asked the Wiki-gatekeeper. He responded, "You're more than welcome to discuss reliable sources here, that's what the talk page is for. However, you might want to have a quick look at Wikipedia's civility policy." Here's the complete conversation. And here the first message the professor got.



The first block was 24 hours for this edit. The user was right "Lady Isabella Frederica Louisa Hervey (born 9 March 1982) is a British socialite, model, and actress. The second block was for two weeks for this edit in which the user changed "are an English" to "is a British". Please look at the article now. It has "British" not "English" . Looks like the user was right because a few newspapers call them "British". The user was also right in this edit, and the user was right in this edit and probably in all other edits as well.

Gwen Gale warned the user, but a new user could not have known what "consensus" and "sourcing" means.

Gwen Gale using unnecessary, rude edit summaries in the block log

On June2, 2010 a user was blocked with the edit summary: "smells like dirty laundry to me".

Gwen Gale responding to canvassing

I will provide only two example. More examples could be presented by request.

1. Here Gwen Gale responds to email canvassing by user Daedalus969.

Here is an example of one such conversation about sent email:

  • Ping!— Dædαlus+ Contribs 11:56, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
  • Pong! Gwen Gale (talk) 12:41, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

What Daedalus969 was doing just before he pinged Gwen Gale? He was commenting on the same AN/I thread that Gwen Gale closed just before she ponged. So as soon as Daedalus969 said "Ping" Gwen gladly responded "Pong".


2. With this edit the user admitted he canvassed Gwen Gale to co-nominate him in his RfA and Gwen Gale responded to canvassing. It is funny that the user made his/her admission in response to admin Guerillero saying that Gwen Gale does not instill any trust in him/her.







Return to "The case against Gwen Gale" page.