SCOTUS granted certiorari to and recently heard arguments on the case of a guy trying to register FUCT as a trademark. The question: Can a phonetically profane word be registered as a trademark?
The US Patent & Trademark Office denied registration of the mark based on its obvious similarity to the past participle of a verb commonly recognized as profane. The case has wended its way through the appellate process (US District Court for DC, Federal Circuit) and now sits before the Nine Wise Ones where it asks them to decide whether a long-standing rule prohibiting the registration of profane words interferes with the trademark holder’s First Amendment free-speech rights. They heard oral arguments on 15 April 2019.
The Roberts Court has a history with disparaging marks, having allowed SLANTS (which the USPTO denied based on its derogatory reference to Orientals) only last year. But SLANTS is not outright profanity. FUCT, phonetically, is. It’ll be interesting to see what this blatantly conservative Court does with FUCT. Seems to me that either the trademark holder will be FUCT or the public will be.