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Actor Tries to Trademark 'N' Word
By Rogers Cadenhead | Also by this reporter
Feb, 23, 2006
The actor Damon Wayans has been engaged in a 14-month fight to
trademark the term "[censored]" for a clothing line and retail store, a
search of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's online database
reveals.
Wayans wants to dress customers in 14 kinds of attire from tops to
bottoms, and use the controversial mark on "clothing, books, music
and
general merchandise," as well as movies, TV and the internet,
according to his applications.
But, so far, his applications have been unsuccessful. Trademark
examiner Kelly Boulton rejected the registration dated Dec. 22,
citing
a law that prohibits marks that are "immoral or scandalous." A
previous attempt by Wayans was turned down on identical grounds six
months earlier.
"While debate exists about in-group uses of the term, '[censored]' is
almost universally understood to be derogatory," Boulton wrote to
Wayans' attorney, William H. Cox, according to the application.
Cox and other representatives of the actor did not respond to
interview requests about the registration.
Wayans can appeal the rejection, but experts in trademark law differ
on his chances for success.
Lynda Zadra-Symes, a trademark lawyer in California, said Wayans may
be successful. She compared "[censored]" to the successful registration of
Dykes on Bikes. The San Francisco Women's Motorcycle Contingent
fought
the Trademark Office for three years to overturn an initial rejection
of a Dykes on Bikes trademark. The mark was published Jan. 24.
"Because the application was by a group of lesbians it was eventually
allowed to publish," Zadra-Symes said.
"This is a great victory," the group proclaimed on its website. "It
affirms our right to determine who we are and how we present
ourselves
to the world."
However, Tawnya Wojciechowski, another trademark attorney practicing
in California, compared Wayans' application to the ongoing legal case
where Washington Redskins trademarks have been challenged by seven
Native Americans. "They're going to have a really tough time,"
Wojciechowski predicted.
The word "[censored]" is ubiquitous in hip-hop music, where it provides
half of a rhyming couplet radio listeners never get to hear in the
Grammy-winning song "Gold Digger" by Kanye West.
Ol' Dirty Bastard used the term 76 times in the 1999 album [censored]
Please, not counting repetitions in a chorus.
In January, an episode of the late-night Cartoon Network series
Boondocks was criticized for putting the word in the mouth of a
fictionalized Martin Luther King Jr.
The effort to commercialize "[censored]" drew a sharp response from a
black
school official who participated in a forum about the word earlier
this month at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro.
"I don't care for it in any form," said Dr. Lonnie Williams,
associate
vice chancellor for student affairs. "Either way you pronounce it,
spell it, anything associated with it -- I find it offensive."
If Wayans succeeds in persuading the Trademark Office to permit the
mark, he may have to deal with Keon Rhodan, a 29-year-old
entrepreneur
in Charleston, South Carolina, who has been using "[censored]" on a line
of
T-shirts, hoodies and other attire for six years in a part-time,
trunk-of-his-car business.
Rhodan attempted to register "[censored]'Clothing" as a trademark in 2001
and was denied by the Trademark Office.
"They said it was disparaging," he said.
Rhodan, who is black, said that he's sold around 2,000 of the shirts
at events. When he began selling the shirts, emblazoned with the term
"[censored]," he thought he would take criticism, especially from older
people.
"I was in the mall with one of the shirts on, and an old lady said,
'Where did you get that shirt from?'" he said, expecting the worst.
"She followed me to the car and bought five shirts for her
grandchildren."
Rhodan believes that affectionate use of the term within the black
community should make it an acceptable mark, but the Trademark Office
has thus far has not been persuaded by that argument.
"The very fact that debate is ongoing regarding in-group usage, shows
that a substantial composite of African-Americans find the term
'[censored]' to be offensive," Boulton wrote in rejecting Wayans.
Though attempts to commercialize "[censored]" coincide with a generational
shift in how the word is perceived, the clothing is still likely to
test some boundaries, as Rhodan demonstrated in a phone interview.
"You couldn't wear it," he said.
Actor Tries to Trademark 'N' Word n
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