The techniques for stopping holy wars, or at least limiting their damage, are pretty much the same everywhere. Even if you are positive your side is right, try to find some way to express #sympathy and #understanding for the points the other side is making. Often the problem in a holy war is that because each side has built its walls as high as possible, and made it clear that any other #opinion is sheer foolishness, the act of surrendering or changing one's mind becomes psychologically unbearable: it would be an admission not just of being wrong, but of having been certain and still being wrong. The way you can make this admission palatable for the other side is to express some uncertainty yourself - precisely by showing that you understand the #arguments they are making and find them at least sensible, if not finally persuasive. Make a gesture that provides #space for a #reciprocal gesture, and usually the situation will improve. You are no more or less likely to get the technical result you wanted, but at least you can avoid unnecessary collateral damage to the project's morale.
--- Karl Fogel, in his book Producing Open Source Software
(Highlights and hashtags added by me)
