Last month the group Lady Antebellum decided they wanted to virtue signal their wokeness by announcing they are changing their name to “Lady A”.
One problem, there already is a black blues singer who has performed under the name for the past two decades and she is calling the group out for stealing her name saying it is “pure (white) privilege” on their part.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, the group is now suing “Lady A” for her name.
The Grammy-winning vocal group filed the lawsuit Wednesday in federal court after negotiations with Anita White broke down in recent weeks. According to the lawsuit, the band is seeking a ruling that their use of the trademark "Lady A" does not infringe on White's alleged trademark rights of the same name. The band is not seeking monetary damages...
But White, who has been releasing blues and soul music for years as Lady A, complained publicly that the band never reached out to her before changing their name. Negotiations over the name failed to reach an agreement.
According to the lawsuit, the band applied for trademarks for the name "Lady A" for entertainment services and for use on clothing back in 2010 and no oppositions were filed by any person or entity.
Last month, Rolling Stone spoke to the real “Lady A” who was not happy with what Lady Antebellum was doing.
She told the magazine then:
“this is my life. Lady A is my brand, I’ve used it for over 20 years, and I’m proud of what I’ve done.This is too much right now. They’re using the name because of a Black Lives Matter incident that, for them, is just a moment in time. If it mattered, it would have mattered to them before. It shouldn’t have taken George Floyd to die for them to realize that their name had a slave reference to it.It’s an opportunity for them to pretend they’re not racist or pretend this means something to them.If it did, they would’ve done some research. And I’m not happy about that. You found me on Spotify easily — why couldn’t they?”She says she will not stop using her name and that “for them to not even reach out is pure privilege. I’m not going to lay down and let this happen to me. But now the burden of proof is on me to prove that my name is in fact mine, and I don’t even know how much I’ll have to spend to keep it.”