A case of Russ the Muss, or ma

Russel's tussle with Chinese Vice- President Xi Jinping's security detail raises some very interesting questions about the meaning of protest. It also shows how the news media's insatiable appetite for conflict is fundamentally re-defining the nature of protest action.

Before going any further, however, we'll need a working definition of both the noun and the verb. What is "a protest"? And, what does it mean "to protest"?

Put simply, protest is about registering your objection to and/ or expressing your disapproval of someone or something. A protest can be individual, or it can be collective, but essentially the protester says: "I don't like this."

Protest can take a wide variety of forms. From the formal, carefully argued protest delivered by an ambassador, to the angry torching of a foreign embassy by a frenzied crowd.

The news media, however, is redefining protest. Rather than use the term in relation to objection and disapproval, it prefers to present protest in terms of provocation, confrontation and agitation.

From being a statement or demonstration of disagreement, protest is now regarded as something very close to an act of aggression.

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This dangerous new definition of protest encourages the notion that any individual or group which sets up a confrontation between themselves and their opponents is guilty of nothing more than exercising their "freedom of speech". Even when it is clear that the confrontation has been carefully engineered to provoke its targets into doing something they will later regret, the protagonists argue insouciantly that this, too, is the protesters' "right".

But the conflation of the right to free speech with confrontational and provocative political behaviour allows those responsible for what would normally be regarded as profoundly unethical acts (such as burning down an embassy) to escape all moral sanction. Basically, if you're "making a protest", you can do whatever the hell you like.

This position is morally indefensible. It is simply untenable to argue that political acts can be conveniently separated from their consequences. With rights come responsibilities: the right to free speech doesn't include the freedom to shout "Fire!" in a crowded theatre.

Protest always occurs within a political context: a unique set of circumstances that the ethical protester is obliged to consider when deciding upon the nature of the protest he or she wishes to make.

What were the major elements of the political context in which Dr Russel Norman's tussle took place?

Most obvious were the deepening economic and cultural ties between New Zealand and the Peoples Republic of China. That Mr Xi, one of the most powerful men on the planet, was here, on New Zealand soil, is a sign of how large this nation now looms in China's diplomatic calculations. The potential benefits for New Zealand's future economic welfare which could flow from this rapidly deepening relationship are considerable.

Against these benefits Dr Norman entered the claims of the "Free Tibet" movement. Highly contentious, politically dubious, and hotly disputed by Chinese Louis Vuitton Monogram Multicolore Replica historians, these claims counted for more - in the minds of the Greens' leadership - than increasing the goodwill already fostered between the New Zealand and Chinese peoples by successive governments.

Well, that was their choice t
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