Well, to a degree Freedoms compete. As the old adage often misattributed adage goes, "Your right to swing your arms ends where my nose begins." Sometimes our freedoms encroach on other people's own freedoms; despite the notion of an unalienable right, such freedoms are only available via force of some means; monetary compensation, organized violence (state or otherwise), and so on. As rights need some external force to validate, to me it seems reasonable and sensible that you're going to have both competing freedoms as the enforcers will hold different freedoms in higher/lower regard than others.

I understand that such a position basically strips away all human dignity and reduces everything to a "might is right" argument, but is that not very much true in many ways? We agree on the freedoms we want to have protected and are more lax about those less important.

The nose hit is a transaction, you supply, I "enjoy". However, I do not agree on the terms of this nose hitting, it only leaves me with a lot of pain. If you would offer me 1 million BTC I might be inclined to agree to the nose hitting, I'm free to do so. I can not be forced into a transaction but I can choose to accept all consequences. No freedom is lost in this case. You should not engage in nose hitting without negotiating the terms of such a transaction, as your should never. You don't know yet if this is a consensual transaction and you should thus withhold from taking an action which clearly involves me.

Yes this is a ridiculous example and yes there are many examples where explicitly negotiating terms is not necessary. When this is, and when it not, is a cultural thing. I mean I shake hands with a woman without second thought, an Islamic Imam may need some special compensation before agreeing to it.

I'm pushing this discussion to the edge because it feels extremely significant to me. Pushing it over my own boundaries also is a way of testing my premises. I'm certainly willing to change my mind.

What if the hit nose is not a transaction? What if an individual swings their arms without care, and your nose merely happens to be in the way? I might get mad at you when I find an obstruction to my swinging. You might equally get mad at me for having hit you. Deciding between these constitutes deciding who has a right in that situation. In the example, you have a right to not be hit. Therefore, I have no right to swing my arms about if it conflicts with that right. However this decision is completely arbitrary; a society could just as easily exist that decides that I have a right to swing my arms about, and you have a responsibility to get out of my way.

> La liberté des uns s'arrête là où commence celle des autres.

Few French people don't know this proverb. It surprised me when I noticed US citizens were much less cognizant of it. Maybe because Freedom is praised so highly we cannot even acknowledge its fundamental limitations?

If someone is at liberty to kill you, your freedom to live peacefully might be severely limited. If someone has the freedom to spread lies about you, your freedom to preserve your own reputation might be severely limited. And so on.