Rights are conflicting, yes thats very old wisdom. But that doesn't mean you can't build an ethical structure based on rights, you only have to prioritize them.

You could say the same about rules: rules are conflicting with each other. Even if they come from a rules-system, like the 10 commandments from the bible: you can always build situations where these things are conflicting with each other. So - that's your point?

People were arguing a case that rights NEVER conflict ever.  In this argument, the rights actually got reduced to one, liberty, and that being one of choice and coersion.  Anything not coerced is right, and anything coerced is always wrong.

And what I had initially brought up is that rights-based ethics systems run into a problem with prioritizing.  When in conflict, it is hard to get people to agree to what should have the higher priority.  Rights-based ethical systems run into the opposite problems that Utilitarianism does, which is that conflicts go unresolved.  Utilitarianism will come up with a formula and calculate the greatest good, and not respect basic rights, which pretty much need to be absolute, in order to be respected.  And this goes into a reason why the foundation of rights-based ethics systems fall short.

Another one is sins of omission.  People here are arguing they don't exist, and reduce moral wrongs to what you do to someone and fail to account for things one can do, but don't:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin_of_omission

Here is a question ...

Since everyone has the right to bear arms would it be reasonable for a government to mandate that an company has to provide their employee with a weapon if they can not afford one?

Part of the point.  The other part is that rights-based ethics systems end up with advocacy groups arguing for certain rights, and a conflict approach to end up resolving them.  You win the conflict and gain the ability to exercise your rights, at the expense of others.  Because of this arguing for rights, on one wants a certain right to have lower priority than another one.  The battle is over this right or that being superior.  Libertarians place Liberty above others (even to the extent of denying other rights exists).  You will see progressives placing the quality of life of individuals above others, including property rights.   Conservatives will place the right to preserve tradition above others.  Individuals who are capitalistic end up placing property rights above every other right.

I would like to see examples of people arguing for one negative right at the expense of another negative right ...

Has everyone the right to bear arms? Not here in europe. But take a society, where this right is given. No, that doesn't imply, that the government has to force the employees to arm you. But such a force wouldn't violate PERSONAL rights either (as companies and the like are not persons), so such a force is not against a rights-based-ethics.

We have a common set of personal rights that are globally mostly accepted: the human rights charta. These rights are well-defined. Also these rights have mostly accepted priorities, so the right of life is higher prioritized than other rights for instance. But even without this priorities these rights seldom conflict.

And yes, nobody said rights would never conflict. I think you make up a strawmen here. Rights can conflict.

And as said, other ethical systems can conflict internally too. You could argue the same way, that living following the ten commandments is ollogical, because you can construct situations in which these rules conflict.

And sorry, many things you call rights, are definitely no personal rights. 'Conservatives will place the right to preserve tradition above others.' As long as it doesn't have any effect on others it's fine. But what you mean if you let them conflict is, that conservatives want to force their traditions on others. But at that point they are no longer in the area of PERSONAL rights. The right to preserve tradition is only as long a PERSONAL right, as it only involves you. So, if your tradition says, you have to tatoo yourself, it's a personal thing. If your tradition says to kill all people of different skin-color, than it's not a personal right.

One of the ultimate entities that would fully manifest the exercising of negative rights is a rock.  A rock sits there, minds its own business and doesn't do anything.  Of course, it is not living and has no needs and doesn't bother anyone.  But it is not alive.

Pretty much when you argue negative rights, you are saying that what you do doesn't infringe upon me in any way.  One area this can happen is in the area of freedom of speech and freedom to not listen.  In a common area, an individual can say they are free to say what they want, and not have this right infringed upon.  Another person says they have a right to not hear what someone says, or be offended.  They will claim to not hear something is their right, as much as the person who says they do have a right to speak.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_rights

If you look at the arguments in this thread, people would argue that only negative rights are rights, and they never conflict, because if everyone lived by the motto of being left alone, everyone would leave each other alone, and no one would have any rights violated.

In regards to conservatives, they will argue, for example, they have a right to raise their kids a certain way, and keep the public square clear of obscenity.  They say their rights as parents warrant this.  And there are others also.  They ARE personal rights.  For the conservative, values they have personally, also belong in society as a whole, because they are collectively shared.  Again, the value of tradition, ends up being elevated above the values that progressives have, for example.  A progressive, for example, would have little qualms going into a church and disrupting a religious service, for political or reasons of ethical concerns.

But the right not to be offended is not a legitimate right ... You are in control over your emotional reactions to what someone says or does, it is not up to someone else to protect your emotional reaction.

To use some examples, a racist may be offended by the presence of black people if a person has the right not to be offended then it is the obligation of the black person to resolve that situation; a homophobe may be offended by the discussion of homosexuality on television, and if a person has the right not to be offended then the television station should not be allowed to broadcast content that offends him.

Essentially, the right not to be offended is a poorly worded positive right; it is the right to have other people provide you with an emotional state of non-offence.