Fighting Talk or Silly Spats?

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Kids will be kids and kids often get into arguments. It’s only natural and we expect it, of course, and as parents or teachers we often have to mediate, show them alternative solutions and calm them down. When people reach ‘the age of maturity’, however, we expect them to have learnt the basic lessons and it is just embarrassing to see two grown people, whom we otherwise might respect, engage in a mud-slinging, name-calling contest in public. Sometimes our initial reaction is to just walk away and let them sort it out but at other times there is a strong wish to knock their heads together to make them see sense! In real life, I find that if I show my embarrassment and just leave them alone for a while, people generally come to their senses and patch it up somehow. If the argument is an online one, it is both more embarrassing (because what was said is there for everyone to read) and more difficult to deal with. How do you deal with this kind of embarrassment, especially if one or both parties are people with whom you are friends or, at least, have hitherto respected?