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Sophie Scholl's nephew, Jörg Hartnagel, defends himself against the appropriation of the Nazi resistance fighter by “lateral thinkers”, AfD and right-wing groups.
Again and again they would use Sophie Scholl "for their own purposes" and would not shy away from "wrong quotations", Hartnagel told the newspapers of the Funke media group.
The tactic is clear: "You are trying to get rid of your own Nazi smell and position yourself in the middle of society."
Sophie Scholl would have turned 100 on Sunday.
Jörg Hartnagel is the son of Sophie Scholl's younger sister Elisabeth and Fritz Hartnagel.
Resistance that becomes "empty phrase"
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His aunt is now revered like a “pop star in history”, said the 71-year-old.
Sophie Scholl is deprived of its content and "as adored as Che Guevara, Jimi Hendrix or Nelson Mandela".
It is not questioned what was behind the resistance.
“Resistance becomes an empty phrase,” said Hartnagel.
The International Auschwitz Committee also criticized people in Germany who compare their living situation and their alleged threat to that of Sophie Scholl.
Such comparisons are "an horror and egocentric presumption for Holocaust survivors," said the executive vice-president of the International Auschwitz Committee, Christoph Heubner, of the Funke newspapers.
On the occasion of Sophie Scholl's 100th birthday, Brandenburg's FDP chairwoman Linda Teuteberg had previously called for a clear opposition to the appropriation of the Nazi resistance fighter.
“Unemployed people also refer to Sophie Scholl - and that on the right and left of the political spectrum,” said Teuteberg.
Both must be clearly contradicted, said the vice-chairman of the association “Against Forgetting - For Democracy”.