In the 1980s, when Inka Winter was just four years old, her mother dropped her off at the headquarters of a “socialist living experiment” just outside Vienna, Austria. Inka’s dad had long-since abandoned them both, and her mother was broke. So she decided to leave Inka in the care of the Friedrichshof Commune while she sought work 450 miles away in Berlin. What Inka’s mom didn’t know, is that the commune wasn’t just a cult—it was a sex cult.
‘Cult’ is a word laden with connotations. It would be unfair to say that the Friedrichshof Commune had nothing going for it. There was housing, schools, and hundreds of members, including many children for Inka to play with. Inka’s mom had already fled from a similar organization while pregnant with her daughter, yet was determined for her to grow up outside of regular society.
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Though Inka’s mom visited every so often, it would be years…
