The Washnigton Redskins are fighting tooth and nail to in their appeal to regain their federal trademark, and they are using other controversial trademarks as their reasoning.
Redskins attorneys presented hundreds of other trademarks that have not been revoked despite being inappropriate for one reason or another.
Here are the details from USA Today:
The Washington NFL team notes in its appeal of a ruling that canceled its federal trademark registrations that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has registered hundreds of what the team believes are racist, misogynistic, vulgar or otherwise offensive marks over the years, citing “TAKE YO PANTIES OFF” clothing, “MIDGET-MAN” condoms and “SLUTSEEKER” dating services, among others.
“To our knowledge, of the over 3 million trademarks registered since 1870, no registration has ever been retroactively cancelled for being disparaging,” the brief says. “The Redskins are the first and only.”
The team’s brief cites a number of other marks and says they are federally registered trademarks listed in a government electronic search database. “None of this is government speech,” the brief says. It argues that federal trademark registration is, instead, government regulation.
“A ban on ‘disparaging’ trademarks unconstitutionally burdens speech based on content and viewpoint,” the brief says, “just as would a ban on registering copyrights for ‘disparaging’ books.”
So basically the Redskins attorneys are snitching on everyone. They are going with the “if I can’t have it, then nobody can” approach and that is both funny and petty at the same time.
I’m not arguing that any of those other trademarks are in the right, but I know for sure that the Washington franchise aren’t in the right and them snitching on others doesn’t make them look any better.
On another note…. TAKE YO PANTIES OFF? Really??? We have to do better.