This chapter discusses two noteworthy cases involving trademark parodies—the decision of the South African Constitutional Court in the Laugh It Off case and an order of the Delhi High Court in Tata v. Greenpeace, which relied on the former.
Author
Arpan Banerjee, Authentix Inc, United States; Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat, Haryana, India.
Summary
This chapter discusses two noteworthy cases involving trademark parodies—the decision of the South African Constitutional Court in the Laugh It Off case and an order of the Delhi High Court in Tata v. Greenpeace, which relied on the former. Both cases are good examples of a “constitutionalization” approach toward IP rights. In Laugh It Off, the court disagreed with the decisions of the Supreme Court of Appeal and the Cape High Court, and permitted the sale of a t-shirt ridiculing a famous beer brand.
In Greenpeace, the court refused to prevent Greenpeace from using an online game to highlight alleged environmental violations of Tata, one of India’s best-known corporations. In both cases, the courts placed primacy on free speech principles. However, Greenpeace stands out for not merely involving a trademark infringement claim but also a defamation claim, and further concerning noncommercial use. The chapter accordingly considers the relevance of Greenpeace, in which a final order is still pending, in today’s context of “meme warfare.”
Published in: Haochen Sun, and Barton Beebe (eds), Charting Limitations on Trademark Rights (Oxford, 2023; online edn, Oxford Academic, 22 June 2023)
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