814
Opinion of the Court
U. S. 726 (1978). No one suggests the Government must be indifferent to unwanted, indecent speech that comes into the home without parental consent. The speech here, all agree, is protected speech; and the question is what standard the Government must meet in order to restrict it. As we consider a content-based regulation, the answer should be clear: The standard is strict scrutiny. This case involves speech alone; and even where speech is indecent and enters the home, the objective of shielding children does not suffice to support a blanket ban if the protection can be accomplished by a less restrictive alternative.
In Sable Communications, for instance, the feasibility of a technological approach to controlling minors' access to "dial-a-porn" messages required invalidation of a complete statutory ban on the medium. 492 U. S., at 130-131. And, while mentioned only in passing, the mere possibility that user-based Internet screening software would " 'soon be widely available' " was relevant to our rejection of an over-broad restriction of indecent cyberspeech. Reno, supra, at 876-877. Compare Rowan v. Post Office Dept., 397 U. S. 728, 729-730 (1970) (upholding statute "whereby any householder may insulate himself from advertisements that offer for sale 'matter which the addressee in his sole discretion believes to be erotically arousing or sexually provocative' " (quoting then 39 U. S. C. § 4009(a) (1964 ed., Supp. IV))), with Bolger v. Youngs Drug Products Corp., 463 U. S. 60, 75 (1983) (rejecting blanket ban on the mailing of unsolicited contraceptive advertisements). Compare also Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U. S. 629, 631 (1968) (upholding state statute barring the sale to minors of material defined as "obscene on the basis of its appeal to them"), with Butler v. Michigan, 352 U. S. 380, 381 (1957) (rejecting blanket ban of material " 'tending to incite minors to violent or depraved or immoral acts, manifestly tending to the corruption of the morals of youth' " (quoting then Mich. Penal Code § 343)). Each of these cases arose in a different context—Sable Communica-
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