>>58248427
>a scenario where Sapphire is in the wrong/instigates a falling out would look like
This happens in RS at the Seafloor Cavern, where Sapphire has the usual tantrum, but she's becoming unreasonable this time because the location turns out to be dangerous and it's no time for tantrums. Ruby just ignores her and keeps her out of trouble until she calms down. Kind of like how you'd handle a kid kek.

It's a change of tactic because in the past Ruby would've (verbally) argued with Sapphire back or let her push him around a bit too much. But by this point, after he'd destroyed all his relationships, finally seen the bigger picture and realized he had to be proactive, he's likely decided fixing his friendship with Sapphire is worth overlooking her retard moments and being patient with her. It's also a delicate line between standing his ground or letting her make a bad decision, and trying to assert his own opinion without using intimidation. Since Ruby hates violence or scaring people (the very things he always associated with and hated about masculinity) but he can't run away from the situation anymore either, he just settled on stonewalling.

The stonewalling tactic fits Ruby better since he can both avoid conflict while technically also dealing with it. In this case he also comes off as the more mature one by not letting Sapphire's anger trigger his own, in what's ultimately him learning male stoicism. But of course ignoring Sapphire isn't the solution to every one of their conflicts, exemplified by their tension in the Emerald arc later on. Though Ruby's just copying his dad at this point who has 0 emotional intelligence so Ruby's not going to know any other way to deal with things at first.