Pattie Gonia asked Patagonia on Wednesday to drop the federal trademark lawsuit the company filed against Wyn Wiley in January, saying the case could strip the drag performer of the name they use for activism, apparel, events and public work. Wiley said the dispute is not a brand quarrel but a fight over whether they can keep using the Pattie Gonia identity at all.
The request lands now because both sides are framing the same lawsuit in starkly different terms. Patagonia says it is trying to protect its trademark and keep the outdoor company’s work intact, while Wiley says the action would wipe out a name that has become the center of their career and advocacy. The case was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and could decide whether Pattie Gonia can continue to operate as a public persona with commercial reach.
Patagonia alleges Wiley moved from using Pattie Gonia as a discrete persona into a broader commercial and activist enterprise after filing a trademark application for the name in September. That filing sought exclusive rights to Pattie Gonia for apparel, marketing and events, and Patagonia says it breached a 2022 agreement that barred the performer from selling branded products or using designs substantially similar to the company’s logo. In its telling, the lawsuit is a trademark case, not an attack on anyone’s identity or advocacy.
Wiley, who said they stayed silent for four months after the lawsuit was filed while trying to resolve it without going to court, cast the case in far more personal terms. They said Patagonia was trying to take away the performer’s name permanently and threaten them with more than $1 million in legal fees, adding that the loss would reach beyond activism and career to the livelihoods of the team they employ. Wiley said that if Patagonia wanted to celebrate Pride Month by taking a queer climate activist to federal court, they were ready to fight.
Patagonia said it had tried to find a path forward that would let Pattie Gonia keep working while protecting the trademark, including multiple proposals and ongoing dialogue. The company said it sought only a nominal $1 plus legal fees. Wiley answered that the choice was between erasure and a fight, and that the company’s move was a betrayal of its own climate-minded mission. Whether the dispute ends in settlement or heads deeper into federal court will determine not just who owns the name, but how much room there is left for Pattie Gonia to use it in public at all.
