The True Colours 5 team's (I, @solperez, @wakeupkitty) decision - during its stint as Community Curators last May - to ‘go out’ further bringing some joy with the power vested in us into a community that seemed unknown to "other forces" on Steem, especially regarding our appreciation of Russian bloggers, has put us under a negative stigma from @antorv, who happened to be an -maybe ex- Country Representative from Ukraine. Read her comments under Week 2 Report here. She challenged our policy of nominating a Russian, she probably failed to see that at the same time we were also nominating Ukrainian author. Instead of her seeing this as a signal of sympathy from us to the two nations being in war, it was the opposite. But we accepted it as part of the job.

Despite the scent that some people seem to be so eager to bring the flames of war in the real world to Steem, the True Colours 5 Team -especially me personally- from the beginning has fully adopted the basic values of Steem, specifically this: avoiding all kinds of provocations related to ethnicity, religion, race, nationality. That's why we don't shun any writer based on such differences.

I am not in a bid to bring up any wounds, or blame anyone. War hurts not only those who are in it. I come from Aceh, currently one of the 39 provinces in Indonesia. Aceh has been in war since hundreds of years ago when Indonesia has not exist. Our grandfathers and grandmothers have fought against many great nations: America, The Netherlands, Japan, and conducted separatism against Indonesia from 1976 to 2005. I experienced the tension of war, the horror of it. I experienced the loss of close ones. So I feel you, both of you, Russians and Ukrainians. I experienced the consequences brought about by the war that some politicians decided to wage. Don't force me to take any side!

Whilst I can understand when you said that True Colours 5 has been the only one voting on Russian authors, let me correct it a little: We don't vote for you because you're Russians, but because we think you deserve it, the same reason for all the posts and comments we curated that was written by users from other countries including Ukraine. And I'm sorry if you feel that the majority of the Steem community seems to have agreed to ostracise Russian bloggers.

Thank you for stopping by and leaving your comment. A great day and good luck for all of us.