The imputed discriminatory part is that the software only shows the additional flags to users with Russian locale, not that it shows the flags at all.

Yah that's where I stand on it. The message isn't harmful or hateful, it dares only make a political statement.

This point in the comments made me think twice:

> People in Western countries don't realize how bad the situation on the ground actually is; random Ukrainian flags showing up on your work monitor can result in severe problems for you (like losing you job, or worse), especially if you work in the government sector. If they show up on your laptop in a random cafe or an airport, you might very well get a beating from one of many "war heroes" that walk around the cities these days.

[EDIT: I see @krunck reposted this at the top level — https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48736518]

Given the number of colonized people that speak Russian, including residents of Ukraine, Georgia, Uzbekistan, etc. etc. etc. I think this sort of Easter Egg based on language rather than geographical location is quite appropriate.

My family speaks both Ukrainian and Russian, and in Russian speaking spaces here in California we find many many many eager supporters of Ukraine's sovereignty, because when they hear Ukrainian spoken they tell us! And also tell us they wish they had been able to keep their non-Russian family language alive too. Most of these supporters are not from the Moscow or St. Petersburg areas though...

It's not even an anti-Russian statement!

I wouldn't get bent out of shape if Xsnow showed me a Canadian/Greenlandic flag in response to me using en-us.

Very much agreed. It‘s a statement by the authors of that software, and that is well within their rights.

How can anyone complain about Ukrainian flags, unless these people have a problem that the Ukraine exists.