Naming as a revolutionary act

As anti-Gaddafi forces advanced through the Libyan capital from three directions – east, south and west –they met no significant resistance from the loyalist troops until arriving at the city’s Green Square.

Upon reaching the square in the heart of Tripoli their first act was bloodless but aggressively symbolic. They renamed it Martyr’s Square.

The end of Gaddafi's green regime

Revolutionaries have long understood the symbolism of naming as a revolutionary act. Practically every Russian town and city of significance has been renamed, and renamed again since the October revolution of 1917.

Libya’s iconic square was the site of protests at the beginning of the anti-regime movement in February of this year, and counter-demonstrations by Gaddafi supporters. Gaddafi spoke to thousands of supporters there on a number of occasions.

But the deeper significance of the renaming lies in the extinguishing of the color green.

The square was built by Libya’s Italian colonial rulers and named Independence Square under the monarchy that emerged after World War II. Following Gaddafi’s seizure of power in 1969, it was renamed Green Square to mark his political movement.

Green became the national color of Libya under Gaddafi. It symbolized the predominant religion of Islam as well as Gaddafi’s “Third Universal Theory” as expounded in his Green Book, his book of political writings, published in 1975.

Gaddafi himself designed the single-color, green flag of Libya. It is the only national flag in the world with just one color and no design, insignia, or other details.

It was a potent, uncompromising statement from another of history’s despots who seem to intuitively understand the dramatic symbolism of names and color.

The flag

Further reading

Rebranding Libya: the death of the World’s only single color flag

Trademarks over the rainbow

Can a brand own a color?

PMS 1837, otherwise known as Tiffany Blue

It has long been a tenet of branding that strong brands are associated with a particular color.  Brand consultants like to refer to it as “owning” a color.

Coca-cola, for instance, can be said to “own” red in the soda category. BP, the oil company, has been associated with green (Pantone 348C) long before it was co-opted by environmentalists. Hertz Car Rental owes its dominant use of yellow by virtue of John Hertz’ original business, the Yellow Cab and Yellow Truck Company.

Legally owning a color is another matter.

Trademarks have been given to single colors. Tiffany Blue is protected as a color trademark by Tiffany & Co. in some jurisdictions, including the U.S. The turquoise color is produced as a private custom color by Pantone, with PMS number 1837 (the year of Tiffany’s foundation).

Canary yellow used in conjunction the name “Post-it” is a trademark of 3M. And Wolf Appliance has obtained a federal trademark registration in connection with the distinctive use of red knobs on its cookers that has prevented archrival Viking from using red knobs for its ranges (see DuetsBlog).

The latest to attempt to corner the color market comes from Louboutin, the French shoe designer.

On August 10th a district court in New York refused to grant him a preliminary injunction stopping Yves Saint Laurent (YSL) from selling shoes with a red sole that Louboutin says infringe his trademark.

In the 20 years since Christian Louboutin made his first pair of ladies’ shoes with shiny red-lacquered soles, his exotically fashionable creations have become an object of desire for celebrities such as Jennifer Lopez, Angelina Jolie and Madonna.

According to the Economist, the puckish Frenchman is the biggest star in high-fashion shoe design, selling about 240,000 pairs a year in America at prices ranging from $395 for espadrilles to as much as $6,000 for a “super-platform” pump covered in crystals. The revenue of his company, Louboutin, is forecast at $135m this year.

Yet all this could be at risk. Louboutin sued YSL alleging that several of its rival’s shoes infringed Louboutin’s trademark on women’s shoes with a red outsole, which was granted to the company in 2008 by America’s Patent and Trademark Office.

In denying the request for an injunction the judge said that in the fashion industry color serves ornamental and aesthetic functions vital to robust competition. He went further, saying that no fashion designer should be allowed a monopoly on color because as artists they all need to be able to use the full palette.

In a flight of fancy he poetically imagined Picasso taking Monet to court over the use of blue in his painting of water lilies, because it was the same or close to the distinctive shade of indigo, the “color of melancholy” he used in his Blue Period.

Can a work of art be considered in the same way as a commercial product? Is it about the color red, or a proprietary design feature of the shoe? It will now be the job of an appeal court to rule on the matter.

And if Louboutin loses again, the company says it will take its case all the way to the Supreme Court while Louboutin, like Dorothy in her ruby red slippers, wishfully clicks his heels three times and repeats, “There’s no color like red.”

Related articles

• Louboutin’s Battle Over Red-Soled Shoes Ends in YSL Victory (inquisitr.com)
• Christian Louboutin Back in Court Today! (theshoeexpert.wordpress.com)

This England, this unhappy breed of men

If you thought those disturbing TV images of riots and cities in flame were from Britain, you’d be mistaken.

Bowing to political correctness BBC reporters have been told by the corporation to refer to the riots and rioters as  ‘English’ after protests from people in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Very apropos the post below (This England) it’s another sign of the degree to which England is being institutionally marginalized by the other component parts of the United Kingdom that want nothing to do with either the UK or England.

The English, meanwhile, are left to bemoan their lack of equal political representation and watch in horror as one very regrettable aspect of English life flares again.

This England

England is a nation that often seems confused and adrift.

Uncertain of its role since the end of empire, the rise of European Community and the increasingly aggressive nationalist sentiment among the constituent nations of the United Kingdom have placed a huge question mark over that piece of the jigsaw puzzle called England.

What is England? Is there still a distinctive quality of Englishness that adds up to a national identity beyond the hoary old clichés of city gents in bowler hats and red double-decker buses?

There is no such uncertainty in Wales and Scotland.  National sentiment runs high. They may be part of the United Kingdom but they are most definitely not English, and then British only grudgingly. Devolution of government from London has given them their own political assemblies. The Scottish and Welsh govern their own affairs and fly their national flags without shame or irony. They have distinct cultures and traditions. They know who they are.

England is a very different story. Englishness has long been conflated with Britishness. Confusingly, historians often used the word “England’ to mean ‘Britain’. If asked, an Englishman would probably tell you he is a Brit. Not so the Scots and the Welsh; they are most definitely Scottish and Welsh.

Political and cultural disconnection of Scotland and Wales from what is Britain has left England with an identity void. There is no English political assembly as there is for Scotland and Wales. The notion of Englishness itself has been mocked and scorned. Attempts have been made to ban England’s banner, the flag of St George, on the grounds that it is racist and might offend Muslims because of St George’s association with the Crusades.

But things seem to be changing, at least on the anecdotal evidence of a brief visit home.

Always a reluctant participant in the concept of a bureaucratic European ideal represented by the EU, the Eurozone debt crisis is eroding what little support remains for Europe. A climate of economic austerity and a rising concern for sustainability seem to have spurred the English to rediscover England.

The flag of St George is more spontaneously visible than ever on the English landscape. It flies modestly but assertively above churches, homes, pubs, factories and public buildings, signaling a new sense of confidence and pride in Englishness and all that is English. It is not politically bombastic or boastful, but quiet and joyous.

The new Englishness is about rich localness and the pleasure of all that England can offer: food, beer, sport, fashion, literature, theater, history and the magnificent native tongue which has become the lingua franca of the world. It has almost everything…except space.

It’s just too bloody crowded. And then there’s the weather…