How GMs Can Handle Player Revolt Situations

In response to this post by Kyrinn S Eis+ I offered some thoughts on how I recommend handling Re-Do's in Tabletop RPGs... This can come up when a player, or players, feel disatisfied with the results of a campaign, or some specific event within a campaign... one that threatens to derail the game and cause a player-revolt... Here's what I wrote:

Situations like this are tricky. It depends a lot on variables that would be hard to measure from a distance. For example, the mood of the other players about the incident, the "fairness" of the ruling to begin with (was this actually a GM mistake, or a player mistake?), and whether or not another means of redress could be derived by looking at the situation with more scrutiny.

As a general rule of thumb my view is that the GM is the Referee, and so the GM rulings should stand, just like in a soccer match when the Referee makes a call. So usually I refrain from bending over backwards to appease players - unless a ruling by the GM was actually a technical mistake (ie - miscalculated the odds). However, the only way to make that work is to establish the GM = Referee modality at the start, and not waver (just like Referees won't waver on their rulings ... if they do it corrupts the system and then after a while nothing will work right). The GM needs to assume the mantle of Referee and act like one throughout the campaign. This cuts down considerably on Player disputes.

Anyway, that's my two cents, though not knowing much about the campaign I can't offer any specific suggestions. I think you are already down the Repair-Road, so that too is always an option, but tricky as well. As a fall back position, my rule of thumb is - make repairs as small as possible whenever possible. Do the absolute minimum necessary to repair a bad ruling. Hopefully only one thing needs to be changed.

In the case of a total re-write, however, which is a worst case scenario... then I go all the way and fold in some sort of Time Reversal ... which is the hardest thing to do convincingly, but nevertheless still possible. I then go for broke and all that happened in the intervening non-existent future is either totally annihilated from reality, or lingers on in one PC's dream as a "what if"...

Of course, I don't know if any of this fits your situation. But them's my thinkings for what they're worth.

What do you think?  How do you handle Player Revolts in your game?