Divine Rights and Branding Fights: Holy Trademark Wars and Their Earthly Tales
Divine Rights, a playful, quick, and informative read by a Los Angeles patent and trademark attorney, explores religious trademark disputes regarding who has the right to use various religious names, terms, and symbols. Diament writes with a humorous, cheeky tone and delights in text incorporating a heavy dose of religious analogies and topical “inspirational” language.
Each chapter of Divine Rights is divided into two- to three-page sections, with plenty of fanciful headings, making this an easy “pick up when you have a minute to spare” sort of book, which amuses as it educates. The first chapter summarizes the basics of intellectual property, and chapters two though eight delve into more specifics about trademarks and provide hypothetical examples as illustrations (such as whether Starbucks could challenge a parody logo by “Saint Bucks Coffee”). The meat of the book, however, is contained in chapters nine through 14 (comprising roughly two-thirds of the book), which dives into varied trademark disputes involving religious entities, which are grouped by general religious affiliation: Judaism, Islam, Christianity, Scientology, Hinduism and Buddhism, and Coexistence. Diament explores litigated disputes with cogent and easy-to-read explanations of each dispute, its resolution, and “Lessons to be Learned.” The chapter on Jewish trademark disputes, for example, considers disputes involving kosher certification marks, online Jewish dating services, Jews for Jesus, and Kabala Yoga. The Christian trademark chapter has sections on disputes involving various denominations spanning the gamut from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) to the Seventh-day Adventists. Among the issues explored are which churches had the right to use the name, “Universal Church,” and what recourse the Archdiocese of St. Louis had when it was promoting the Pope’s upcoming visit and an adult entertainment company registered the domain name of “papalvisit.com” and posted “spicy content” there.
Divine Rights is suitable for lawyers who seek a basic primer on trademark disputes, and it would be an outstanding option for trademark practitioners to pass along to the lay people in their lives. However, lawyers may understandably experience some frustration with the fact that while actual case names are used in his examples, Diament fails to provide any citations to these cases or to cite any supporting authorities. While in-text citation might get in the way of his breezy, light-hearted style (Diament is certainly knowledgeable about this field), Divine Rights could still have provided a list of sources in an appendix. Additionally, it would be apt for Diament to explain his use of pictures of the symbols, which are the subject of trademark disputes he details in this book. The book could have also been enhanced through a discussion of real examples that have apparently not resulted in formal challenges; Diament emphasized that the LDS church is very protective of its trademarks and ensuring terms, such as the “Book of Mormon,” are used appropriately, yet he failed to address the musical, “The Book of Mormon,” and opine on whether use of that term in such a context was permissible. Overall, the humor used in addressing the topic of religious trademark infringement makes Divine Rights an enjoyable read and conversation starter.
