Just something fundamental first: I never questioned the principle and legality of a criminal trial, nor did I do so in a state that is a constitutional state for all. No, I simply warned about the injustices and dangers that this process harbors here in Hungary. I wouldn’t have acted any differently in Germany. A democracy must allow such contradiction against authoritarianism and oppression. Every judgment that is made here will also have to be measured by whether and how my speech and appearance will be punished. In recent months, however, the impression has become stronger that the Hungarian state does not allow these contradictions. Demonstrations and rallies are banned and solidarity with this process is made more difficult. A threatening atmosphere is being set up to make people afraid of being treated as terrorists. Are protest and solidarity, whether from our own parents or from unknown people, really what endangers our society? Are you afraid of me, afraid of my dad when he grabs the microphone, or a friend who shouts a slogan?!
25 months of pre-trial detention are behind me. After the first six months of imprisonment in Germany, I was illegally extradited here. I asked the Federal Constitutional Court to prevent this extradition, and this highest court in Germany actually ruled in an emergency order and in a later final decision that the extradition order was illegal, unconstitutional, because queer people are excluded by the Hungarian state. Yes, we have been erased from the constitution, our words and our speech are criminalized, our being is supposed to become invisible. I, too, having escaped the binary gender constraints, found myself as Maya. But the Federal Constitutional Court’s emergency order came too late. The Saxon LKA kidnapped me in a nighttime blitz, flew me out of Germany and rushed me into solitary confinement.
Long-term solitary confinement with less than 2 hours of meaningful human contact per day or solitary confinement is considered white torture. I’ve been putting up with it for 18 months. The reason for this is grotesque. At first it was said that everyone else should be protected from me because I was brutal and dangerous. After a year, they suddenly pretended to want to protect me from other people’s hatred of queer people. The isolation is accompanied by daily humiliating coercive measures and a special security order, the reasons for which are still classified today. Long-term solitary confinement, sleep deprivation, humiliation, violence – these are all practices used to force confessions. They are intended to wear down and destroy souls, to rob people of their dignity, to make them lose hope and self-respect. Just put your beloved houseplant in the basement and you’ll understand what’s supposed to happen to us prisoners.
I’ve known this courtroom for a year now. For 16 days of the trial I sat tied up on the wooden bench behind me and listened intently to how my life was being negotiated in this trial. I remained silent about the allegations. These were little more than two weeks of negotiation days. But when I look in the mirror, it must have been years. In my first attempt to find a “final word” for this procedure, I described my current “self” as a “withering flower.” Because humans also need sunlight, but above all closeness, security and community to survive. But all of this is withheld from us, the incarcerated in society.
Dear public prosecutor, in my case it didn’t work. Yes, even if I am shaking today, haunted by restlessness and nightmares, even if I am deserted by all emotions after days of loneliness, even if my throat is tightening to see how many other people are suffering under these political procedures – I still have a friendly smile left, as well as a morality, a universal morality. And when my breath catches in my cell, I look up at the strip of sky where I saw the wild geese in autumn and hold on to the belief that solidarity resists violence.
After a year and a half in prison, I went on hunger strike to denounce all the human rights violations that we incarcerated people experience. I let my life teeter on the edge to force those in charge to take action. It was certainly also an expression of desperation. The time of starvation was certainly a quiet and wordless time. But above all, my hunger strike was an expression of hope, a tender hope, as tender as the little flower that I planted in the cracks in the wall between the window and the bars. My hunger strike was an expression of my desire to live and create. It was a cry for love that resonated a thousand times over, and it was an indictment of those who denied me relationships, education, and work in prison.
The little flower no longer blooms. Months of fear and waiting, even entire seasons, have passed. People I love died. Grief waits as I fight loneliness and hope to return home. And I will come back as an acting subject. You will never be able to reduce me to a manageable object. Because every day I experience the warming solidarity of many people and find role models among them who give me courage. They show me that we have our own choice, no matter how painful it may be. And they also show me that a fairer, more peaceful coexistence is possible. No, I’m not naive. I see the power to do this in the shimmer and shine of your eyes. I am so grateful for all of your arms that wrap tightly around me when it gets dark and cold.
Yes, I demand and long for freedom. I allow myself to fight for my freedom and the freedom of everyone. I don’t need the power to lock lives in and out. I don’t have to make final judgments about other people. The public prosecutor should be happy to do that. Freedom is something different for me. It thrives on the belief that together we can create something more just than prisons, camps and deportation centers, that we can create something more peaceful than handcuffs, weapons and armored divisions. For me this means looking for what can remain for those who come after us, preserving what freedoms have already been achieved and allowing every doubt to give rise to a new risk. And I speak out of hope because there are so many people who do not obey contempt, who feel neither the right nor the duty to do so.
This process, like those in Munich, Düsseldorf and Dresden, is a political process. Here the state claims that it is being threatened, that it is the victim of violence. We all know what verdict the Prime Minister of this country wants. The public prosecutor offered me 14 years in prison in exchange for a confession and I face up to 24 years in prison. This sentence is intended to support their narrative of murderous Antifa hunting people. And I am aware of the concerns that this sentence will be abused to banish me from society for half (or all?) of my life as a deterrent to everyone. Despite this, the indictment prompted me to write a trial statement and explain how antifascism wants to be the basis of my actions and the prerequisite for my claim to universal justice. Antifascism is the necessary self-defense of democratic societies against totalitarianism, authoritarianism, destruction and contempt. The emancipatory, anti-fascist doctrine that remained with us after war, fascism and colonialism was portrayed as terror, not only in the indictment, but also throughout the trial. There is nothing in me that craves violence. There is no desire to hurt or kill, in fact my mind resists it. I don’t want to be a tyrant or a hero. In the first draft of my last word I wrote that I would like to remain a flower child, roaming the human gardens with tenderness, always attentive, curious and affectionate. I know I was and am, promise myself every day to stay that way, never forget the desire to do this together.
However, I think that alone does not allow me to understand the political dimension of these processes. They go far beyond my personal experience. I have to ask myself what it means when peaceful demonstrations are banned, but not the demonstrations of the fascists who throw feces at us, when there is censorship and defamation, when the basic idea of democratic resistance ends up on the terror list, when we are all declared enemies of the state, when banks close the accounts of solidarity organizations, when legal assistance is criminalized, when human dignity is only available to some, when civil society… State representatives are declared enemies. We don’t know where this ends. We can only promise to never stop protecting and defending life.
In my first draft I wanted to write about three dried flowers as symbols of love, friendship and diversity. They are three small, delicate flowers that I received pressed in a green card and that I have held in my hands repeatedly over the last 25 months. I am determined to preserve all of this and give back as much as I can. Thanks to you, I understand that it is worth staying, that it is worth hoping, and I feel security where I stand at your side, where it becomes necessary, where there is no hesitation. And I know there is a place there, as magnificent and vibrant as a wild flower meadow, there is a place beyond the dungeons and far away from all the violence where you and I can be human among humans.
Thank you for your attention and thank you that during these two years, these 16 days, so many of you have always been by my side, whether near or far. I love you, una promessa rimane ancora, ci farrenó vivi!