Destruction of the Family deja vu: Soviet Style

The nuclear family was enemy number one for the Soviet Communists of yesteryear.  Ironically, many of the same tactics applied by the Bolsheviks are being employed in modern-day America.
Said Orlando Figes in his monumental work The Whisperers:

The family was the first arena in which the Bolsheviks engaged the struggle. [T]hey took it as an article of faith that the 'bourgeois family' was socially harmful: it was inward-looking and conservative, a stronghold of religion, superstition, ignorance, and prejudice; [that] it fostered egotism and material acquisitiveness, and oppressed women and children.

The Whisperers, page 8

Bolshevik Communism had as one of its major goals the compelling of women to leave the family and join the workforce, whether they wanted to or not. Their children noticed.  Typical of such memories, Marksena Nizovtseva recalled:

I felt the lack of a mother's attention...and was always jealous of children whose mothers did not work.

ibid. pages 11-12

One way of enticing husbands and fathers, wives and mothers away from their parental and spousal duties was the lure of free love.  This was accomplished by loosening the influence of religion on marriage and family, and by declaring that other social units were equal to the nuclear family.

The new Code on Marriage and the Family (1918) established a legislative framework that clearly aimed to facilitate the breakdown of the traditional family. It removed the influence of the Church from marriage and divorce, making both a process of simple registration with the state.  It granted the same rights to...couples living together.  The result was a huge increase in casual marriages and the highest rate of divorce in the world.

Sexual promiscuity was more pronounced in the Party's youthful ranks than among the Soviet youth in general. Many Bolsheviks regarded sexual license as a form of liberation from bourgeois moral conventions and as a sign of...'modernity'.

ibid page 10-11

Bolshevism used dedication to the Party as a means of tearing families apart.

It was commonplace that the Bolshevik [male] made a bad husband and father because the demands of the Party took him away from the home. 'We Communists don't know our families,' remarked one Moscow Bolshevik.  Bolsheviks were far more likely than non-Party husbands to abandon wives and families.

ibid. page 11

Josef Stalin taught that

A true Bolshevik shouldn't and couldn't have a family, because he should give himself wholly to the party.

ibid. page 2

Stalin set an "excellent" example in this regard by the way he treated his own wife--like a dirty rag when it suited him.

Many of these overt Communist tactics sound eerily familiar in the 21st century. Familial destruction and denegration is all around us.  Conversely, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints stands resolute in declaring the family to be the fundamental unit of society.

We, the First Presidency and the Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, solemnly proclaim that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children.

We warn that individuals who violate covenants of chastity, who abuse spouse or offspring, or who fail to fulfill family responsibilities will one day stand accountable before God. Further, we warn that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.

We call upon responsible citizens and officers of government everywhere to promote those measures designed to maintain and strengthen the family as the fundamental unit of society. 

Communism failed, in large part because it destroyed the family. We would be foolish indeed to not learn this fundamental lesson from history.