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Revision as of 07:47, 23 April 2006 by Avillia (talk | contribs)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff) | This page documents an English Misplaced Pages ]. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page. |
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 | This page in a nutshell: Gain consensus before reverting the administrative actions of others. Do not repeatedly revert administrative actions done by a specific administrator/to a specific article. |
A wheel war is a struggle between two or more admins in which they undo another's admin actions — in particular, unblocking or reblocking a user; undeleting or redeleting; or unprotecting and reprotecting an article.
Just as edit warring is considered harmful and needlessly divisive, wheel warring is not considered good behaviour for an admin. Since Misplaced Pages works on the spirit of consensus, disputes should be settled through civil discussion rather than wheel wars. Wheel wars occur when admins get too "heated up" to discuss something, or when an admin takes it upon him or herself to undo another admin's actions without consultation, or deliberately ignores an existing discussion (usually at WP:ANI or WP:DRV) to implement their preferred version.
Jimbo Wales has said that "wheel warring is a very bad thing, and the culture around it needs to change."
Preferred behavior is:
- If you think something is a good idea, do it.
- If people disagree, take a step back and discuss.
Undoing blocks
The blocking policy specifically cautions against undoing another admin's block: "If you disagree with a block placed by another admin, please contact that admin to discuss the matter."
Enforcement
Most editors (and admins) tend to agree that wheel wars are not good. Sometimes, admins are temporarily blocked for wheel warring, but this can result in a wheel war itself if the blocked admin or a friend undoes the block. Wheel warring has been cited as undesirable by the ArbCom in a case that led to deadminning of the admin in question. A number of options for a tighter definition, with the status of policy, have been proposed.