I don't think this qualifies, as the definition is as follows:
>prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism by an individual, community, or institution against a person or people on the basis of their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalized.
There is no discrimination on racial or ethnic lines going on. If Russia wouldn't have invaded the Ukraine they wouldn't have put their citizens in this mess in the first place. Actions have consquences
Actions performed by one set of people (government). Consequences are for average Russians, who don't have any say. Those who "actioned" did not face any consequences still, and I don't think they will.
Almost 2 years passed since invasion, EU still buys resources from Russia. Children of Russian politics still live and study abroad, EU and US included. But average Russians, yes, they faced a lot.
Yes, that's wrong too. But, you know, those happen but that doesn't mean this is right. It is possible to be both against the war in Ukraine, Guantanamo Bay, the way the Israeli state handles Palestine and be pro Jewish all at the same time.
I think this doesn't quite qualify if it only affects customers that are currently in Russia.
If a person was born in Russia, created their Hetzner account there, then emigrated, and they still get their account closed, that's "judging them for something in the past that they had no control over" - quite similar to racism in my book.
If they get a chance to show that they are not "based in Russia" and then their account is not closed, then I think it doesn't qualify, because in that case it's really an action against a country as a whole, not the people who happened to be born there.
Updating their postal address with appropriate supporting documentation should be enough to avoid termination for accounts that have emigrated. They said in the email to "take appropriate action now". If you left but never updated your postal address, that's on you. There's no racism going on here.
This doesn't seem to be the case. I registered my Hetzner account while living in Russia, and in 2022 I emigrated, and updated address - I did not get any termination letter. Looks like they are banning only those who presently live in Russia - not everybody who ever lived there.
Following your logic: US and its NATO minions are brutalizing countries nowhere near them (Syria, Serbia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya - to name a few from the last 30 years), it had (still has?) prisons where Muslims were tortured and the world should have sanctioned it and its businesses and citizens with the harshest sanctions for that.
I don't really care about the USA in the original context I'm talking about, they're down their own shit creek. Don't live in either country. All I know is that the side you seem to be cheering for hit my own's hospitals out of spite.
Mostly because racism is such a blanket term that it covers:
* Religion
* Ethnicity (real and percieved)
* Attachment to statehood
In the 19th century, many scientists subscribed to the belief that the human population can be divided into races. The term racism is a noun describing the state of being racist, i.e., merely subscribing to the belief that the human population can or should be classified into races with differential abilities and dispositions, which in turn may motivate a political ideology in which rights and privileges are differentially distributed based on racial categories.
FWIW The UN does not define "racism"; however, it does define "racial discrimination". According to the 1965 UN International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination,[22]
> The term "racial discrimination" shall mean any distinction, exclusion, restriction, or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin that has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.
Shit take, "race" has nothing to do with it. Ethnic Russians living in other countries (of whom there are many) are not having their contracts terminated. People who aren't ethnic Russians but live in Russia (again, many people) are having their contracts terminated.
Both of these figures, Russian diaspora and ethnic minorities in Russia, are in the neighborhood of 30 million people.