Last month, the Supreme Court struck down a never-enacted California law banning the sale of violent video games to minors. While the decision was refreshing for those of us who believe that the First Amendment’s command that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, including expression that might offend a majority’s sensibilities, the decision does cast light on one of our nation’s more interesting social paradoxes: Americans are, by and large, highly morally and legally permissive of some types of obscenity, like gratuitous violence, and very restrictive of others, such as pornography. Ultimately, this case is illustrative of why it is best not to pursue overarching legal remedies to social problems.

The intellectual argument for restricting minors’ access to violent video games is almost identical to the rationale used to restrict minors’ access to sexual obscenity. The argument goes that children, as an impressionable, developing and socially protected class, should be shielded from influences likely to deleteriously warp their personal values and prevent them from becoming upstanding members of society. This argument can be made equally well to support preventing minors from accessing deviant sexual images as well as grotesque violence, but the overwhelming majority of people — including myself — probably would only support obscenity restrictions in the first case.

While I’m highly offended by pornography, I also enjoy gutting virtual villains with embarrassingly large medieval weaponry just as much as the next guy. This double standard may not be problematic on a personal level, but it is highly dubious on a legal level. It cheapens our legal system and muddles our free speech doctrine to arrive at two different answers to what is, dispassionately, the same constitutional question. One could even argue that the idea of children becoming deranged sociopaths as a result of exposure to violence is substantially worse than them becoming perverts after seeing lewd sex acts. Further, any legal or legislative attempt to address this issue necessarily restricts the lifestyle freedoms and preferences of the tiny minority whose values differ from the mainstream, which is always a risky business in a country that prides itself on pluralism, non-invasive government and minority rights.

None of this is to suggest that minors shouldn’t be screened from viewing pornography. It is merely to point out that in a society structured like ours, law and social values almost never mix well. Thankfully, there is a solution to this conundrum that both accommodates admirable social goals like protecting the innocence of children and that does not involve any kind of law at all: personal and parental responsibility.

People of all views and from all walks of life rightly point out that it is incredibly difficult to raise children and preserve cultural and moral values in this day and age. Children are assaulted by a tidal wave of frequently pernicious influences that tug us in often regrettable directions. However, turning to legal or legislative action is an exceptionally poor substitute for exercising restraint or employing some tough parenting. The government can never hope to protect the minds and hearts of children anywhere near as well as their parents can, and any ham-handed attempts to do so are more likely to weaken our civil liberties than produce more grounded citizens.

If parents don’t want their children to see lewd images or play violent video games, they should actively prevent them from doing so in their own homes. The law is a poor guardian of social values, often lagging far behind the mainstream. In so doing, it creates divisive inter-generational political conflicts. If some people ultimately deviate from accepted social norms, while regrettable, our civic values demand that we tolerate and respect their choices. To do otherwise is to abdicate responsibility for our values and the values of our children, as well as to invite pointless and usually fruitless conflict. Social values are almost always better left in the private realm, where moral differences and double standards create neither intellectual conflict nor bad law.