I recently heard of an entrepreneur named Matthew Beck who created "Hookers for Jesus" and "Redneck Jesus" trademarks. He was denied the right to create a "Porno Jesus" trademark that would promote a franchise of sexually-explicit entertainment products for adults by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Attorneys representing the office send Beck's request was denied because the trademark would consist or be comprised of "immoral" or "scandalous" material and includes material that may "disparage," bring contempt" and "disrepute" individual persons, institutions, beliefs or national symbols. The appeals board was worried that the mark would link Jesus with pornography and that it might upset American Christians. If a fundamentalist Christian wanted to create a trademark that said "Yahweh Loves Killing Gays With The Power Of AIDS" or "Neo-Pagans Murdering Children For Satan", would the U.S. Patent and Trademark office support the passing of such trademark titles?
Would it be acceptable to do a "Porno Satan" trademark as suggested by The Church of Satan on their news blog entitled "Third Side Intelligence" which includes a link to an external article that was posted on March 18th, 2015? The character of Satan is included in pornographic films and nobody seems to have any legal objections to that. Jesus is dead, so how is it going to harm him by having a pornographic trademark named after him?
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