The Satanic Temple files copyrights, trademark infringement lawsuit against Netflix, Warner Bros

The Satanic Temple, a nontheistic religious and political activist group based in Salem, Massachusetts, filed a lawsuit against Netflix and Warner Brothers for $150 million on November 8 at the US District Court for the Southern District of New York alleging that the companies infringed on its copyrights, violated its trademark, and caused injury to its business reputation.

The lawsuit focuses on a monument of Baphomet (a deity that the Knights Templar were falsely accused of worshipping and that subsequently was incorporated into disparate occult and mystical traditions) which appears in TV series “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina” produced by Warner Bros and distributed by Netflix.

The lawsuit states that the depiction of Baphomet in the TV series infringes The Satanic Temple’s copyright covering the sculpture.

According to the lawsuit, the Satanic Temple is an organization “designed to encourage benevolence and empathy among people rejecting tyrannical authority, advocating practical and common-sense justice, and undertaking noble pursuits guided by individual will.”

The lawsuit observed that the statue depicted in the TV series is similar to The Satanic Temple’s 2.7-metre bronze sculpture of Baphomet (copyright registrations VA 2-116-0092 and VA 002124601) unveiled in Detroit, Michigan, in 2015 as both include two children looking up at Baphomet, which is pointing two fingers towards the sky.

The Satanic Temple therefore argued that the show “unquestionably copied” the sculpture and that “the similarities are no coincidence”.

According to the Satanic group, “Extensive world-wide publicity and media coverage made the Baphomet statue famous, and the statue is ‘inextricably linked’ with the group.”

The Satanic Temple said, “To have that all at once entirely eclipsed by some Netflix show by a production department who did a Google Image Search... a lot of people who haven’t heard of us first stand to just recognize that monument as the ‘Sabrina’ monument, which dilutes and denigrates the entire project.”

The Satanic group then said that as the TV series prominently used the Baphomet monument as “the central focal point of the school associated with evil, cannibalism and possibly murder”, such an association injures The Satanic Temple’s business.

However, in this regard, the group said, “The Satanic Temple, on the other hand, ‘does not promote evil and instead holds to the basic principle that undue suffering is bad, and that which reduces suffering is good.’ It hails Satan as a ‘rebel against God’s authority, rather than an evil being’.”

Considering the above issues, the Satanic Temple thus claimed for injunctive relief and at least $50 million in damages.