User:Masem/Gamaliel case

In regards to Gamergate
I am adding this evidence to augment the evidence Dennis Brown mentioned in their section above. I believe that I was the editor most "harmed" (in that I had to suffer from extended personal attacks and ad hominem statements made by MarkBernstein) while Gamaliel was actively administering the GG topic area. I use "harm" in quotes only because I was frustrated with the lack of action on the issue that I felt was obviously a disruption to consensus discussion in the topic area that Gamaliel was in a clear position to stop, and do not claim any type of personal, emotional, or other type of harm due to the perceived inaction.

The specific timeline of events related to this are:
 * Gamaliel instituted a topic ban on MarkBernstein on the GG area on Nov 28 2014, as a result of this discussion at the dedicated General Sanctions page for GG (before the ArbCom case completed) General sanctions/Gamergate/Requests for enforcement/Archive1. I point out Gamaliel's comment at 17:38, 28 November 2014 that describes MarkBernstein's behavior as "In my judgement, MarkBernstein's rhetoric is incompatible with collaborative editing on these articles and he has given no indication that he will moderate his behavior in this area. For that reason, I am imposing an indefinite topic ban, broadly construed, on User:MarkBernstein." a point agreed to by other admins there. I would thus reasonably expect that Gamaliel, from this, knew the type of language that MarkBernstein used and that that was something that he was banned for.
 * Note that this ban was established one day after the Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate started. As such, MarkBernstein's behavior was determined not a subject of that ArbCom case, likely on the presumption the topic ban would remain indefinitely.
 * MarkBernstein was blocked twice  in January 2015 for violating the topic ban.
 * Gamaliel, in what appears to be on their own decision, lifted the topic ban on Feb 7 2015. Please note on the timing, this happened just after the conclusion of the GG ArbCom case, of which five editors that would normally align with MarkBernstein in the GG situation were blocked/cautioned. Without digging into the GG talk page, I remember this did cause further issues on the GG talk page that that time, and I agree Gamaliel was right in that "However, [the topic ban] has also served to silence your dissent about this issue and has prompted those who disagree with that dissent to play gotcha when you have made non-disruptive statements tangentially related to the matter covered by the topic ban." That said, the fact that Gamaliel released the ban with this caution: "Given your assurances that you will no longer engage in the disruptive behavior that prompted the ban, I am now lifting the sanction completely.", I would argue that any disruptive behavior by MarkBernstein is from that point, partially, Gamaliel's responsibility. It should also be noted at this point, MarkBernstein's behavior (as well as mine and others involved at the GG case) are now under the general sanctions from the ArbCom GG decision. This technically overrides the original topic ban from Nov 28, 2014.
 * MarkBernstein was blocked three times for violations of the GG ArbCom sanctions   within the month and half from Gamaliel's topic ban release. It is rather apparent that this is the same behavior that Gamaliel saw from in Nov 2014, though with different people involved. Gamaliel, best I can determine, was not directly part of these blocks.
 * Among other AE cases that Dennis mentioned, I filed an AE against MarkBernstein in Sept 2015 for what I felt were the same aspirations that MarkBernstein had been using from Nov 2014. Gamaliel here is quick to dismiss these concerns and as a result, I voluntarily step away from the GG topic area for three months and Gamaliel tells MarkBernstein "don't be a jerk". Given how MarkBernstein has acted before, a history Gamaliel should know very well at this point, a slap on the wrist for that continued behavior is rather disconcerting, particularly based on the above Feb 7 2015 statement about lifting the original topic ban and MarkBernstein's assurance he would not behave that way any more.
 * I did not return to the GG topic area until this March, but when I came back I was immediately met with more ad hominem attacks from MarkBernstein (which I specifically chose to ignore), which I documented in this last AE towards MarkBernstein that closed a few weeks ago . Of interest towards this situation with Gamaliel, this discussion which had MarkBernstein respond to me  with more attacks reiterating the same attack that got him topic blocked before. Ryk72  and PeterTheFourth  made additional comments immediately after this, both which I know as originally seen to have some unnecessary snark in them. Gamaliel shortly after that partially revdeled these contributions   -- while leaving MarkBernstein's personal attack towards me sitting right above it on the talk page, clear as day.
 * As Dennis Brown noted, Gamaliel opened the Arb's discussion on this last AE by telling the filer to DROPTHESTICK.

Collectively, this to me looks like a pattern from where Gamaliel has gained sympathy for MarkBernstein and has chosen to taken a blind eye to enforcing MarkBernstein's behavior despite being the one to let him off the hook from the original topic ban. As for why this has happened, I don't know, and can only make wild guesses, but with the only commonality is that GG is a right-wing issue, and MarkBernstein and Gamaliel apparently lean to the left in very broad terms. I also know that Gamaliel has become a target of ridicule on the various GG boards, not as much as MarkBernstein but enough that we have to be wary of offsite interference in these areas. In either situation, however, it would still be reasonable to presume that Gamaliel is sufficiently involved in GG that they should not be involved in trying to admin these areas. We are running into a lot of topics arising from the news where Wikipedia's current sets of policies and guidelines, taken as "law", create more disruption than stability, and we need people as admins to act with cooler headers and without any personal or political biases; in Gamaliel's situation, I think they have lost that required objectivity and should be asked to back away from such areas and/or respect when others have pointed out their faults.

Moreso, if Gamaliel had either retained the topic ban, or re-instituted it after any of the March 2015 blocks, that the amount of disruption that the GG topic has created and spilled over across the rest of WP would have been severely reduced (I wouldn't say it would have been eliminated, it still remains a hot topic area). MarkBernstein was the focal point for most of the disruption of consensus building on that page. I can easily forgive one or two lapses in judgement on Gamaliel's part or letting one or two missteps by MarkBernstein slide, we are human of course. But I think it's very clear that something should have been done with MarkBernstein much sooner, and Gamaliel's actions (whether inadvertently or not) led it to becoming as bad as it did. I will say that Gamaliel did try their best to stop those that were inappropriately egging MarkBernstein on and were making the situation worse, which was not easy to do, but that doesn't mean that one can assume MarkBernstein is not at fault either, and the prolonged inaction and attitude to do something about that is worrisome.