All in the best possible taste
Where do you draw the line between what is acceptable to profit from and what is not?
For the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the question would seem, on the surface, fairly clear cut. In a long anticipated decision, which culminated in June, the office’s Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) comprehensively cancelled six trademarks belonging to the Washington Redskins American football team.
The trademarks all contained variations of the word ‘Redskin’, which is widely regarded in modern society as being a racial and disparaging slur.
“We decide, based on the evidence properly before us, that these registrations must be cancelled because they were disparaging to Native Americans,” the TTAB wrote in its ruling.
The decision was a sure-fire sign that the USPTO would not accept the possibility of an organisation or individual profiting from an offensive or rude word.
But, as some have argued, if the word was not offensive in the late 1960s, when the team was granted the first of its trademarks, it should be able to hold on to them.
In most jurisdictions, a trademark’s offensiveness or perceived controversy is based on its meaning at the time of application. The TTAB said it recognised this and that even when the trademarks were registered the term was still disparaging to a “substantial portion” of Native Americans.
