Monday’s decision by the US Supreme Court permitting four Chinese-American musicians to trademark their band as The Slants seems to open the door to other free speech use where some people will be offended. The most prominent of these is the Washington Redskins football team which continues to use the name even though the US patent office has invalidated the team’s trademark on it. The Redskins say the name honours Aboriginals. The Slants faced a similar patent office ban. In his decision, Justice Samuel Alito wrote that restricting speech that offends “strikes at the heart of the First Amendment.” He did not flinch from possible animus contained in such language. “Speech that demeans on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, age, disability, or any other similar ground is hateful but the proudest boast of our free speech jurisprudence is that we protect the freedom to express the thought that we hate.” It is a challenging standard which may never be applied in Canada.
