As a practical matter I'd agree that being too idealistic is possible.
You are mistaken on several levels. Let us take a closer look.
If compromise with other people is anathema, even if it would relatively improve your position, then you can hardly expect to get anything done when confronted with individuals of opposing viewpoints. In the end, exactly nothing was accomplished save for tilting at windmills.
Your reasoning is incomplete by virtue of the fact that you have not specified the nature of the compromise in question. This is essential in order for your position as stated above to hold any palpable meaning. Specifically, and as relates to this particular discussion, there are two general categories of propositions which may be considered for compromise: those of a fundamental nature and everything else.
To compromise on fundamental issues is a form self betrayal the timbre of which is strongly reminiscent of suicide. You suggest that failure to compromise nets you zero gain. One must first determine whether one wishes to "gain". If my position is already what I wish it to be then I may have no interest at all in improving it. That aside, consider an example. Imagine your neighbor decides he wants your backyard and places the demand before you. What do you do? By your reasoning, you should perhaps "compromise" for, say, half. This way you lose only half of the territory demanded. But what if the following week the neighbor comes back and demands the remainder? What then? Compromise for half yet again? Well, if that will shut the neighbor up, perhaps it is a good thing, right? So now you hold 1/4 of what you held just a week prior and your neighbor has taken what is not his to take, holding 3/4. But in the interests of peace you decide to be satisfied. Unfortunately, after another week lapses the neighbor is at your door once again demanding the remaining 1/4 of your yard. What now? And so the pattern goes and has gone WRT human rights, especially in the United States. Today, things that people did routinely are now offenses for which you may be executed on the spot by police. Barring that, you may face a long spell in prison. In the very best case, you are never caught but must always act in a way that suggests you are actually a criminal, including all the stress of having to conceal what you do, whether it be smoking a joint after work, buying some time with a prostitute, or carrying a gun for self defense in Chicago.
I certainly hope that you would have the sense equal to at least that of the average boiled turnip and throw such a neighbor off your property. But why? Because your neighbor would be attempting to violate your private property rights, which are
fundamental and inherent to your status as a living, breathing human being. You would be right to resist such attempts to take from you that to which another person holds no legitimate claim, up to an including killing them if they attempted to employ force. Property rights are FUNDAMENTAL and must therefore never be compromised away.
The same may be said for any right such as that of free speech, religion, keeping and bearing arms, etc. If I concede some small part of my right to practice my religion, I have in principle conceded the entire right for there is no basis for drawing an absolute line in the sand that says "here and no further". Any demand to diminish a right is
necessarily arbitrary. This can be demonstrated apoldictically but I will not do so here as I have a screaming headache at the moment and want to go to bed.
Fundamental rights should NEVER be compromised for any reason, at any time, no matter who is making the demand. The only proper response to any demand to cede one's territory is a proudly displayed middle-finger, preferably painted dayglo orange or pink for extra emphasis. Compromise on fundamental issues ALWAYS diminishes the position of the party being trespassed upon. There are no exceptions to this, even if the loss on the one hand is balanced by some marginal gain on the other because the net gain on the one hand results in a net loss of FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS on the other. Fundamental issues of any nature should never be allowed to be diminished by even the smallest epsilon.
Anyone attempting to employ physical force against you to gain compliance with their demands should be killed on the spot and without hesitation, quarter, or mercy. I am very serious about this, but note that I also speak normatively as our so-called "justice system" is so hopelessly lousy and corrupt that doing what is right will often earn one felony charges and perhaps a long prison term, or even summary execution by those paragons of state power, the police. Therefore, in positive terms I could only advise caution.
Having covered the fundamentals, we may now turn to everything else. For example, if your colleagues and you are to go to lunch and you want Indian but everyone else wants Chinese, perhaps it is not so big a deal to compromise and relent to their wishes, particularly if you can get them to agree that next week it shall be Indian. Non-fundamental issues may be compromised because compromise
does not diminish you or your basic rights (claims) in any way whatsoever.
If some third party offers you some gain in exchange for a concession (each in
fundamental terms), then somewhere along the line someone, somewhere has stolen from you because that which is inherently yours that is now being sold back to you. It is strongly analogous to having a burglar show up to your house and offering the silver candlesticks he stole from you the previous night in exchange for your 82" flat screen TV. Instead of trading, you should be introducing his teeth to a set of brass knuckles, or perhaps a marble slab.
No man in his right mind trades a right that is already held in exchange for ceding another to some vulture.
Compromise is betrayal.
Compromise is
criminal.
To believe anything other than this is to delude yourself most egregiously. That, of course, is your fundamental right.
