If you want to get teenagers to stop doing something, the best plan of action is to tell them it's destructive and then prohibit them from doing it. That's only backfired... just about every time it's ever been tried.

The recent test case involves Mayor Thomas Menino, who is attempting to make violent video games even more popular and desirable amongst kids by prohibiting their sale to minors.

Violent crime is something that Boston needs to urgently contend with. Violent video games (Grand Theft Auto and its successors are what's usually pointed to) are hardly the best tool for the moral development of youth in our society.

But to say that violent crime is caused by violent video games (without providing a shred of evidence) is ridiculous, a waste of our time and money and attention. Plus, even if there was a link, a ban wouldn't keep kids from the games they want. (How long has pornography been banned from minors, and how's that been working out?)

Our city needs better schools, safer streets, safer buses, more money for after school programs and job programs. We don't need moral grandstanding disguised as policymaking: it's a distraction from the real problems we face.