Can you Trademark a lifestyle?

If you are in any way connected to the gardening or green community, you've assuredly heard of the mess that the Dervaeses have caused.  They decided to trademark Urban Homesteading and multiple other common, everyday phrases.  Their reasoning was that it was to protect the wording from the big, bad agribusiness people.  If that had been their sole action, it wouldn't have been an issue.  What they instead did, was to send letters to bloggers, authors, libraries, coops and Facebook. 

These letters informed people that they now had no legal rights to continue calling themselves Urban Homesteaders.  If they did, they would need to give the Dervaeses full credit for the wording.  This is of course ridiculous.  The end result has been a massive backlash from the community that they count on to support them. 

There is an ever growing community on Facebook, that is bringing people together.  It seems to be the one good thing that has come out of this whole mess.  Everybody is coming together like they never had before. 

Those of us who are Urban Homesteaders tend to be non conformists anyway.  We tend to be the neighbors that get talked about.  We also tend to be the ones who are so passionate about what we do, we can't help telling everyone. 

Since I am that neighbor, I can tell you that it's exciting for people to see what we do in our little yard.  It also seems to spread rather quickly.  More and more neighbors and friends are gardening in their own yards.  They're asking questions about what it is that I do.  It's exciting to see Urban Homesteading grow.   

So, I'm am declaring that I am an Urban Homesteader.  Are you?