![]() ![]() In July 2019, Punisher #13 (by Matthew Rosenberg, Szymon Kudranski, Antonio Fabela and VC's Cory Petit), the Punisher is badly injured in a fight with a Hydra agent and he is accosted by a pair of police officers. When asked about its stance on cops using the Punisher's logo, Marvel pointed to a Punisher comic book that was published last year as its position on cops using the Punisher symbol. That is certainly something that people can criticize, but the cops likely have a First Amendment right to do so.Īlong those lines, then, one thing that Marvel can do is to denounce the use of the logo, something the company has already done. The police have chosen to express themselves through an association with the Punisher. If they are restricting their usage to just painting the logo on the side of their vehicle, though, then it is likely that the cops would be protected by their First Amendment right to free expression. If the groups were to sell the posters and/or decals, that would be a whole other matter. This is a grayer area, but even here, it is unclear whether Marvel's trademark over the Punisher logo can allow them to tell people that they cannot use the Punisher logo for non-commercial uses. A year later, police groups debuted a "Blue Lives Matter" response movement and a number of "Blue Lives Matter" groups have incorporated the Punisher logo into "Blue Lives Matter" posters, decals and things of that nature. The protesters particularly spotlighted police killings of African Americans, which, in turn, tied into protests against racial profiling, police brutality and the overall mistreatment of African Americans within the American criminal justice system. ![]() In 2013, the "Black Lives Matter" movement was launched to protest the systemic racism and violence that African Americans face in the United States. RELATED: Twitter Presses Disney To Sue Police For Co-Opting Punisher's Iconic SkullĪ trickier issue is when police officers create their own Punisher logos. Major League Baseball cannot tell a cop that they are not allowed to wear a Red Sox cap. It would be similar to a cop wearing a Boston Red Sox cap. Once you have purchased a fully licensed piece of merchandise, you gain a broad right to use the merchandise as you wish. Without that aspect in play, trademark owners cannot do much to make people stop using their intellectual property. As noted, the protection for trademarks generally goes towards people using the term to make money off of the logo. That's the same basic problem with Marvel and the Punisher logo worn by so many police officers. If you use it as part of your business, though, it is using the mark in commerce and the trademark owner can (and often will) come after you. You can draw Mickey Mouse on your kid's wall and that's fine. The most infamous example of this sort of thing was when Disney threatened a Florida daycare center over unauthorized murals of Disney characters on their walls. So you can use the trademarked term while the bar/restaurant cannot. A bar or a restaurant, however, would be. The difference, then, is that when you are having a party at your house, you are not using the term in commerce. However, when bars or restaurants advertise such parties, they are forced to note that the party is for "The Big Game," since "Super Bowl," of course, is a trademarked term owned by the National Football League (NFL). People have them every year at their homes. A notable example would be Super Bowl parties. If the intellectual property is not being used in commerce, there is not a whole lot that the owners of the trademark can do about people using the trademark. This means that the intellectual property is being used in commerce. ![]() A trademark, simply put, is a mark that is used in trade. The key problem with enforcing the use of the trademark with police officers, though, is found in the word trademark itself. That is not the case, though, as the Punisher's logo (designed by Gerry Conway and John Romita Sr.) is clearly a distinctly stylized skull, and its distinctive design certainly can be trademarked. One area where there is confusion is over whether Marvel can even enforce a trademark on the Punisher's logo, since it is seemingly "just" a skull and, therefore, would be too generic to trademark. RELATED: Marvel Responds to Use of Punisher Skull by Police Officers ![]()
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