> Even if they were under a neutral flag everyone would think of the person as Russian. Yeah because they're from Russia. I just don't see how "people will thi

> Even if they were under a neutral flag everyone would think of the person as Russian. Yeah because they're from Russia. I just don't see how "people will think" is enough of a reason to ban them from playing an event. (1) Some deranged person running Russia decided to invade Ukraine, kill innocent people and ruin millions of lives. (2) A chess organization in Norway bans a player because they were born in the same country as the deranged person from above. I don't get how (2) is an appropriate response to (1) or how it helps anyone. It's not a deterrent, it's not any kind of response - nobody in the Russian government will feel the tiniest bit of pressure because of it, it's such a token act that it's laughable to think about in the context of what's happening in Ukraine. At the same time it's a big deal to the handful of players it affects. All this does is create publicity and make the careers of a few people significantly worse just because they happened to be born in the wrong country.