Wikipedia:WikiBullying
This is an Wikipedia:Ownership of articles policies. This page provides additional information about concepts in the page(s) it supplements. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. |
This page in a nutshell: Bullying is not permitted on Wikipedia, and any violators will be blocked from editing . |
WikiBullying is using Wikipedia to threaten and/or intimidate other people, whether they are Wikipedia editors or not. Doing so violates
If you feel that you are being
There are essentially two forms of bullying on Wikipedia:
On Wikipedia, all editors have
Stating a real policy when it is necessary is not considered WikiBullying.
Forms of WikiBullying
Asserting ownership
There are experts, or those otherwise very knowledgeable of a topic, in every field who create and make major contributions to the articles relating to that topic. They may be familiar with where to find sources of information to establish notability and vouch for accuracy, and have better overall knowledge (see
POV Railroading
Point of View (POV) railroading refers to the use of bullying tactics to discredit or eliminate an editor with an opposing viewpoint.
False accusations
False accusations are a common form of bullying on Wikipedia, although people do sometimes make
Misrepresentation
Quoting others out of context and other forms of
Making "no-edit" orders contrary to policy
Another form of wikibullying is to issue no-edit orders which are not backed by current policies (or guidelines). A "no-edit" order is a message sent to a single editor (who is not
There are some no-edit orders that are acceptable. For example, if a consensus has already been formed regarding a topic, and a single editor has constantly stubbornly defied the ruling, politely discussing this one-on-one on the user's talk page is acceptable.
If an
Wikihounding
Wikihounding is the singling out of one or more editors by maliciously joining discussions on multiple pages or topics they may regularly contribute to and in order to repeatedly confront or inhibit their work. This is usually done with the intent to create irritation, annoyance, fear, or distress to the other editor. Wikihounding usually involves following the target from place-to-place on Wikipedia, and often can be identified by reviewing the offending user's contributions. If they are suddenly joining multiple discussions that the intended "recipient" regularly, or even recently, participates in and with no evidence that they had participated or even expressed interest in those subject areas before, and if this sudden participation is usually, if not solely, met with
Hidden text is frequently used to give editing instructions. There are some acceptable and unacceptable uses for hidden text. Hidden texts may be suggestions, in which case they should not to be taken as law, or they may be notes about current consensus among editors, or about
Some unacceptable uses are:
- Telling all other editors not to edit the page
- Telling others not to remove a section of the article, as if the section were written in stone
- Telling others that a page should not be proposed for deletion, when this may be doubted by others
- Writing new guidelines that apply specifically to the page and branding them as "policy." In the past, policies that have been proposed for a single article have failed to attain a consensus.
Real life threats
Scaring or making threats against the person, either on or outside of Wikipedia. See also
The Wikimedia Foundation, if need be, will investigate or arrange for law enforcement to investigate threats of violence.
What bullying is not
A few things are often falsely identified as bullying:
- A robust response to determined attempts to insert disputed content into an article.
- Taking actions against attempts to promote a POV.
- Sanctioning editors who do not take on board criticism.
- Sanctioning editors who will not accept consensus.
If you complain of bullying, admins will look at your own edits and check to see that you have not been engaging in
Don't make unfounded complaints of bullying. For one thing, they undermine your own credibility. But more importantly, they trivialize the harm done by actual bullying.
See also
- WP:User interaction investigations
- WP:LAWYERING
- WP:Disruptive sanctions
- WP:Don't edit for power
- WP:Overzealous deletion
- WP:Misuse of administrator tools
- WP:Personal sanctions
- WP:Give 'em enough rope, and they'll hang themselves