When comparing items, sometimes the item that is better than the other in a certain aspect is colored red instead of green. For example, Bash and Cut Protection (clothing stat) is colored red when it is higher, and green when it is lower. Another example that comes to mind is Dispersion (firearm stat), where higher numbers are colored green, and lower numbers are colored red. Isn’t higher protection supposed to be better than lower protection and lower dispersion better than higher dispersion?
I am playing in 0.6 right now (Mac user 
), if that helps.
I play the 0.71-20-g0fa51e2 version on windows, the Bash and Cut Protection colored right, but the Dispersion still wrong.
From what i remember the protection works in relation with coverage. So if you got item a with protection 10 coverage 50 and item b with protection 9 coverage 100 or sth similar b is better than a and coloured green.
Edit: http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=1780.msg21108#msg21108
That makes sense, but sometimes even that doesn’t work. I’m comparing a t-shirt and a polo shirt right now. The t-shirt has coverage 80% and protection 3 (therefore, with that logic, an effective protection of 2.4). The polo has coverage 85% and protection 6 (effective protection of 5.1). Yet, the t-shirt’s protection is colored green and the polo’s protection is colored red.