A recent Supreme Court ruling has opened the floodgates for trademark applications using obscene language.
Vulgar trademarks suddenly have an unprecedented chance.
The Supreme Court’s June ruling in Matal v. Tam said a provision in the federal law that bans disparaging terms in trademarks was unconstitutional because it violated the First Amendment.
Now a slew of crudely demotic trademark applications are making their way through the federal bureaucracy.
Before White House’s new communications director Anthony Scaramucci stunned Washington this week by telling a reporter that the White House’s chief strategist, Steve Bannon, was “trying to suck his own cock,” a South Carolina man called Michael B. Bressman applied to use the phrase “cock sucker” as a trademark. He did so on the day of the Matal v. Tam decision. According to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s website, Bressman sought the trademark for “candies molded in the shape of a rooster.”
Bressman’s application remains “live,” awaiting a decision from the federal government. There are more than another 50 live applications for trademarks involving some form of the word “f**k.” Here, with a few strategic asterisks, are some samples: “EAT A SHUT THE F**K UP SANDWICH,” “Wake The F**k Up,” “Calm The F**k Down,” and, simply, “SHUT THE F**K UP.”
The ruling has also improved the chances that several trademarks disparaging President Trump will prevail, including applications for “DROP THE BOMB ON TRUMP” and “Trump’s Pack Of Lies.”
At the time of the high court’s decision in Matal v. Tam, the victory for the name of the Asian-American rock band, “The Slants,” was celebrated by free speech advocates and others who viewed the case as a skirmish in the proxy war over the Washington Redskins’ name.
It remains to be seen whether the growing heap of live applications for politically incorrect trademarks will succeed.
