Those convicted of solicitation in Oakland, Calif., risk having their faces displayed on bus stop signs or 10-foot by 22-foot billboards.

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"I tell people who say to me that prostitution is a victimless crime they should know about the 217 under-age girls who were arrested for prostitution in Oakland last year," Oakland City Council President Ignacio De La Fuente told the San Francisco Chronicle.

"We're going to shame the out-of-towners and locals who drive to our neighborhood to look for prostitutes."

Colonial America often used public punishment to shame and shun wrongdoers, but that was supplanted by imprisonment and attempts at rehabilitation, however, shame-based punishments began making a comeback in the 1980s, the Chronicle said.

For example, a Florida judge ordered a woman to buy a newspaper ad explaining she had purchased drugs in front of her children and a Texas judge ordered a thief to clean out police stables.