In Anaheim, California, anyone convicted of
buying sexual services will have their names and mug shots
indefinitely posted to a city web page listing “Sex Purchasers”.
The Anaheim district attorney’s office says the scarlet HTML is
meant to deter sex traffickers, which makes about as much sense as
posting jaywalker mugshots in order to deter car theives. No, let’s
call this for what it is: straight-up, old-fashioned, puritanical
public shaming.
Anaheim, in Orange County, unfortunately isn’t the first Cali
city to implement this online shaming tactic. Fresno and Oakland
also post the pics of those arrested on prostitution-related
charges to Facebook, those these photos are then deleted after two
weeks. Richmond, California, started doing similarly earlier this
fall—until people’s propensity for digging up and sharing the
addresses, employers, and other personal info of exposed sex
workers and clients caused the Richmond police department to
reconsider the parameters of the plan.
“Public shaming as a form of punishment goes back to the days of
Puritan colonists,” writes Los Angeles Times‘ Emily
Foxhall. “In recent years, it’s become a strategy for police
departments targeting the sex trade. … Orange County’s move is
expected to heighten debate over whether public shaming is
effective at reducing prostitution and whether it exposes johns to
too much scrutiny.”
While public shaming may be a historic practice, there’s
undeniably something different about exposing someone in a town
square or local bulletin than in a medium where the exposure has
potential global reach into perpetuity. For supporters of such
measures, however, I guess that’s part of the appeal—the chance to
serve up potential lifetime humilitation and punishment for those
who would dare to seek sexual satisfaction in the marketplace. And
if that sounds like a harsh assessment of their motives, consider
this paragraph from the Times article:
Publicizing the identities of johns is not considered part of
the punishment and would not be up for negotiation in a plea deal,
(DA cheif of staff Susan Kang) Schroeder said. Asked if concern for
solicitors’ personal lives factored into the decision to identify
them, her response was unforgiving.“Give me a break.”
Yet even many who want to banish prostitution aren’t keen on the
idea that publicly shaming those who get caught will make much of a
dent on the sex trade. Melissa Farley, executive director of the
anti-prostitution group Prostitution Research and Education, told
the Times she’s unaware of any evidence that
this kind of shaming results in long-term behavior change.
Peggy McGarry, director of the Center on Sentencing and
Corrections at the Vera Institute of Justice, has said that public shaming punishments have
“no record of efficacy in turning someone away from crime,”
especially when it comes to low-level offenders.
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