Clouded by the current world situation, Helau and Alaaf can only be heard muffled, if at all, this year.
And the otherwise urgent discussions about the harmlessness of disguises move into the background, questions such as whether one should let one's child go to the carnival as an "Indian" or with a sombrero.
Carnival is no longer so easy to celebrate.
We talk to other parents about how we feel about the costumes.
Are they racist, or have we become too sensitive?
“When I was in elementary school, the children often dressed up as people from other nations and ethnic groups.
We children first had to explain carnival to my mother: I told her that my friends were going to 'dress up' as Chinese and French.
'Then you go as a Pakistani!' was her simple yet ingenious idea.
All we had to do was pull the traditional clothes out of the top drawer in the closet and my 'costume' was ready.”
“In Israel, the Purim festival is celebrated in the spring.
Children and adults dress up to commemorate the rescue of the Jews in the Persian Empire.
Colorful carnival processions move through the country.
As a kid on the kibbutz, I didn't have much choice when it came to costumes.
I was allocated whatever was in stock and my size.
I used to be a samurai, a dwarf or a Russian Cossack.
Once I had to slip into the lined 'Eskimo' costume under the blazing desert sun.
The girls appeared as 'Chinese' with made-up eyes or 'Dutch' with clogs.
That was our image of the people of other countries, since at that time hardly anyone from the kibbutz was abroad.”
Even such childhood stories can become problematic nowadays.
The Greens politician Bettina Jarasch had to apologize last year for her "unreflected childhood memories" because she said in her candidacy speech that she wanted to become an "Indian chief" even as a child.
Nowadays, disguises that stereotypically imitate people of other origins or hairstyles that come from other cultures are seen as expressions of "cultural appropriation".
But not every kind of imitation is meant: if we wear two pairs of lederhosen and a dirndl at the Oktoberfest, the advocates of the concept will not sound the alarm.
But when presenter Annemarie Carpendale dresses up in an "Indian costume" or Justin Bieber shows up in dreadlocks - both of which happened last year -
Comments like these reached Carpendale: “Other cultures just aren't costumes!
It's cultural appropriation and racist.
Period.
Take off the costume, throw it in the bin, and listen to the voices of those affected!” Bieber, the repeat offender — who had the hairdo back in 2016 — had thousands of comments, such as, “Pretender.
You stand up against racism, only to then wear dreadlocks as a white man.” It's not just showbiz celebrities that get the grudge of the critics, but also left-wing idols like Sea Watch captain Carola Rackete when she wears dreadlocks.
Well, what does the human lives she saved matter if she allowed herself such impertinence!