“Mottchen*, what I fear most is that the new right-wingers will become a majority again.”

My mother voiced her fears back in the early 1990s. She fled Koenigsberg with her parents because of the Red Army when she was 7 years old. She and her father suffered physically and emotionally all their lives as a result of their experiences of flight and expulsion.

My father migrated to Germany from Jalandhar, India in 1957, hoping to realise many of his dreams here.

At that time, my parents were a couple who faced a lot of racist hostility, including from their own families.

When my mum told me her fears, I thought that it wouldn’t happen again. Ever since Trump was able to become American president, I have feared that my mum’s fears and both my parents’ experiences could become reality.

I am glad that my parents did not have to experience the Russian war of aggression on Ukraine or the rise of the AfD (the German far right).

Against this background, it is important to me to fly the flag against the right and in favour of peace and diversity.

*you can roughly translate this nickname with “my little butterfly”.