They weren't protesting the tax on tea. The Tea Act essentially (1) exempted the East India Company alone from taxes on tea, giving it an unfair advantage of almost monopolistic strength and (2) undercut local smugglers who had been profiting from the Townshend Acts by illegally importing tea.
It was a protest against an unfair monopoly and what we would call today dumping, not a protest against the tax itself, though the tax was hideously unpopular.
And the destruction of the tea was a decision of a 130 people (roughly 130 people, who knows the right amount, the correct number is lost to history) in a town of 20,000. It was those 130 people who decided for the rest of the city that they wanted to create economic terrorism by destroying the property of another. I see this (myself) as illegitimate at its core even if you are trying to argue it was a great means to a greater end.
Yes there is nuance between taxes and tariffs and whether we give one company an exemption / exclusive right under mercantilism, but my complaint is not about this. If you think this is an important point then I am going to have to disagree with you on that. My complaint was mobs are just part of human nature and we "love" to judge each other on the mob aspect when in reality this stuff always existed.
Oh and even though this aspect of human nature always existed and will always exist, the real choice is whether we "celebrate it" after the fact and create a whole mythology around it. How we respond to this aspect of human nature is the most important thing in my mind.
Creating a mythology that uplifts these "noble" people, or call them "profane" I see that as the true hubristic act.
