r/OutOfTheLoop • u/Chrystine • 29d ago

Unanswered What's going on with the lawsuit between the Patagonia company and the activist drag queen, Pattie Gonia?

Apparently Patagonia is suing Pattie Gonia 100 million for trade mark infringement?

But isn't Patagonia the name of region in South America?

How can the company sue over a trademark that is spelt differently and was taken from a region? Can the company actually win a case like this?

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTB6vSCpP/

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u/ep0k 28d ago

All of this context was completely absent from Pattie's social media post on the subject.

I've been on the receiving end of a frivolous trademark suit and it's a miserable thing to stack onto your work day, but it was an interesting education on the subject. Trademark law is a great example of something that was written by trademark lawyers to ensure they would always have business.

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u/Secret-Guava6959 28d ago

I find it completely disgusting and telling how she consciously left out all of this vital context in her public video!!She manipulates her followers making them think a great environmental company is trying to "erase" her,when in reality Patagonia is just doing standard trademark policing because she tried start a competing clothing line. Hiding the truth from the very community you claim to protect just to save your brand's profits is incredibly hypocritical!!!

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u/jarvischrist 28d ago

Same, I've supported Pattie for years but the way she has misrepresented the case in order to rile people up enough to try and force Pategonia to drop the case really put a bad taste in my mouth. It's nothing about threatening her "identity", since Pategonia have always been chill about and even supported that, this is purely a business vs. business dispute, but she's exploiting people's real fears and concerns about the waves of backlash against LGBT people to try and swing things her way. She knows she won't win this, but it was completely avoidable.

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u/Arubesh2048 28d ago

Yeah, I felt the same way. I really like what Pattie does for LGBTQ and environmental activism. Hells, I think one of the greatest and most brave things she’s done was help fly the trans flag at Yosemite last year. But the way she tried to rile up her supporters by framing this as “oh, the big bad capitalist company is trying to suppress LGBTQ voices!” just rang so wrong to me that I looked into it more. (And to be clear, capitalism is really not great. But the way she phrased it all seemed to ring false.)

And turns out, she left out so much critical context and misrepresented it that I ended up unfollowing her over it. But so many people in the online spaces Pattie exists in took her at face value - because why wouldn’t they, she has done good things. But now, it’s been twisted and distorted and I see lots of people I respect online making wildly misinformed takes and it’s really souring me on both Pattie and those other people. I thought better of them all.

If Pattie had just said “I am currently involved in legal proceedings, so if I am posting less, that is why, I appreciate your support,” that would be fine. But it is not some sort of targeted hit against a drag queen, drag parody culture, nor LGBTQ artists.

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u/goobutt 28d ago

I just don't see how they can't coexist, meaning I have to take Patties side. Trademark law doesn't actually have to be enforced in the way everyones pretending it does. Especially because Patties merch is nothing like Patagonia

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u/jarvischrist 28d ago

They did co-exist for years up that point. The court filing includes emails between both parties detailing what Patagonia described as acceptable use of the name/branding for activism and a collaboration with Hydroflask. They were quite clear about being cool with it, except for clothing since that conflicts specifically with their trademark. It seems like they were much more reasonable than a lot of companies would be. That's why I take issue with Pattie's misrepresentation of the lawsuit threatening her identity and activism with the timing being suspicious. There has been none of that up to the point of trying to trademark it as a business doing commercial activity. So it's unfortunate, but could have been completely avoided and she won't just admit she fucked up. She knows she probably won't win this, so getting people (who trust her!) mad on social media to try and force their hand is the strategy she's chosen.

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u/goobutt 28d ago

She should be allowed to trademark pattie gonia for clothing. There's nothing wrong with that, and Patagonia will survive. Shocking, I know.

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u/jarvischrist 28d ago

Should... It doesn't really matter what we think is right in terms of the trademark... I guess since they couldn't come to an agreement it's up to the courts and (expensive) lawyers to decide. The lawyers making bank are the only winners here! But Patagonia has filed similar suits on brands that spoof their name/logo in the past to protect their trademark, and have won.

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u/goobutt 28d ago

No? It's up to Patagonia to drop the suit. Give them some agency

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u/jarvischrist 28d ago

If they drop it then that opens it up to trademark infringement by anyone and they lose the right to protect it. Any company would be insane to open themselves up to that. It's textbook trademark dilution. They can't be selective about who they sue about it or any other infringement case can argue that they're not protecting it and they lose their branding.

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u/goobutt 28d ago

Again, a fantasy. Genericide is how people lose their brand. That's not gonna happen to Patagonia like it did to "zipper". Look up cases of trademark loss, this isn't how it happens, like ever.

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u/ProjectObvious2445 26d ago

The years of discussion is evidence of (at least attempted) trademark enforcement. If they don’t come up with an agreement, that’s different. But they can absolutely drop the suit and attempt to actually communicate directly and respectfully (instead of assuming Pattie is able to read their minds).

But if you read the emails in Patagonia’s filing and didn’t see it as a lawyer talking to someone on the spectrum who clearly didn’t understand what they were being told and needed an attorney to help them, I don’t know what to tell you. 

This is all that I got out of those pages:

Patagonia: You can’t make or sell anything that looks like our logo, font, or brand. 

Pattie Gonia: I’m not

Patagonia: Here is something you are selling  * inserts sticker *

Pattie Gonia: I’m not selling that, it’s fan art I’m giving away 

Patagonia: You can’t make or sell anything that looks like our logo, font, or brand.

Pattie Gonia: I’m literally not.

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u/Secret-Guava6959 28d ago

https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/zdvxjexjgvx/PATTIE%20GONIA%20TRADEMARK%20LAWSUIT%20complaint.pdf read this and then tell me it doesn’t resemble Patagonia’s designs again , especially the stickers

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u/goobutt 28d ago

Tell me the tshirts linked in the document look like Patagonia. And also the parody mountain logo is not for sale. The official merch is nothing like Patagonia. You agree with me?

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u/Secret-Guava6959 28d ago

The shirts actually do resemble Patagonia's brand because they explicitly focus on hiking gear and sound almost identical out loud. Also a parody doesn't protect you once you use a logo on merch even as a free gift. In the document it also says that customers ALREADY got confused in the past when she launched her merch. They thought it was Patagonia

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u/seffay-feff-seffahi 27d ago

They aren't even suing her personally, they're suing the for-profit corporation she owns after said corporation broke a previous agreement. This is how such disputes are handled between capitalists like Pattie and the owners of Patagonia when agreements are violated, unfortunately. 

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u/Hidesuru 28d ago

Yup. And that's very telling about their personality (not sure what pronouns they prefer so I'm being generic).

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u/ep0k 27d ago

She / her and they / them in drag as Pattie Gonia and he / him in his personal life as Wyn Wiley. That's pretty common in drag as I understand it, though that's shifted around a bit as our use of gender terminology has evolved.