When a friend talks badly about another friend

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Hi there.

Recently I have run into a bit of a problem. I have two friends that I talk to regularly, though the two of them don't know each other. We all play the same online game, and the other day I was talking with one of my friends on skype. At some point the conversation turns, and my friend start talking badly about my other friend based on rumors that he heard about her.
It made me feel really uncomfortable, and I tried telling him that the rumors were not true, but he refused to believe me and I literally had to tell him to back off and stop talking badly about my friend. I don't think I came across so nicely, but anyways my question is if it was alright for me to tell him to stop cause I didn't want to hear it, and what do I do in the future if he starts talking badly about her again. As I see it, it seems like he has a problem with respecting her.
I don't want to pick sides, but I sort of feel that I could get pushed into a situation like that.

That sounds like a hard situation to be in. You can tell your friend you don't want to hear it, you don't want to hear anything bad about your friend or hear what he heard.

Why did it make you feel uncomfortable?

I think if it had been me I would have either ignored him, or just said " . . . but you don't know her."

You did exactly what I've seen professionals recommend to do in that situation. Make it clear that you do not want to engage in gossip or bad talk about another friend. After you've made it clear, if the other person keeps doing it, walk away.

Continue to be their friend if you want to still be their friend, but every time they start talking bad about your other friend, walk away (or do the online version of walking away) until eventually they realize that you will not tolerate that kind of behavior.

It is up to you whether you just disappear or whether you say, "I asked you not to bad talk my friend to me" and then disappear. But in order to be taken seriously as someone who will not listen to gossip about someone else you care about, you will have to leave every time the other friend starts it.

I've been in that situation. I told the complainy friend that if he kept it up, I would be unable to continue the friendship. He stopped.

I absolutely hate that. Hate it when friends try to pressure you to take sides. It makes me retreat, and next thing you know, the friendship with both people is over. It's part of the reason I basically have no friends these days.

In fact, I had a good friend for about ten years. Then her marriage started going sour, and she kept wanting to tell me all kinds of unsavory things about her husband. But I like her husband. He wasn't a close friend like she was, but I still liked him, and didn't want to hear bad things about him. Still, I wanted to be a supportive friend, and it's true that some of the things he did weren't so great.

I think our friendship is over, though, because I was not willing to say, "yes, he's a horrible bastard."

I was going to say that it gets better as you get older, because people mature. I suppose that's true, but it's not 100% true. The friend I lost just turned 50.