Today we’d like to introduce you to Desirée Townsend
Desirée , we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I am known to the world as the “Flu Shot Cheerleader” from 2009. I was one of the first people to go viral before social media really took off. At the time, I was working as a communications manager for AOL and had just made the Washington Redskins Cheerleader Ambassador squad. I ended up developing an autoimmune disease called stiff person syndrome, which was recently covered in the news as Celine Dion also has it. The onset of the disease was several weeks after receiving a flu vaccine. However, the cause is actually genetic and was never related to the vaccine at all. Regardless, Jenny McCarthy and her anti-vaxx organization Generation Rescue took my story and used it to give birth to the anti-vaxx movement and what it is today… a multi-billion dollar industry of nutraceuticals, botanical oils, gadgets, and other unproven potions, treatments, and “cures.”
Since 2009, I went back to school and obtained a degree from UC Irvine in biochemistry and molecular biology. I try to educate people on vaccine safety and other complex biotechnology topics. I have been nearly unemployable for years because of the media coverage of me, despite doing an updated piece in NBC last August. To this day, nearly 15 years later, people still attack me including pro-vaccine individuals in the medical community: https://www.instagram.com/p/C8AK7qqJeoS/. This led to me starting a company with my co-founder Tom, called SparkMarks™ – sparktrademarks.com. We offer D.I.Y. trademark courses and services to bring down the cost of trademarking a brand. Now, what was once a luxury item for large companies, is accessible to everyone. So what was a negative for me, I was able to turn into a positive for others and help people afford trademarking.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I don’t think anyone’s road in life is smooth and mine has had many twists and turns. When I was 25 I wanted to be a CEO and leave a legacy as a great leader. Instead, I was thrown into fame not because of my hard work or merit, but because I got sick with an illness that is often misdiagnosed and dismissed in women. The fame I received was in the form of memes making fun of my illness. Worse yet, I was pulled into the middle of a very contentious debate over vaccines, in which both sides can be vile, judgmental, abusive, and even violent.
The most interesting part about this entire experience is watching what “cancel culture” has become. It has been 15 years since my story was covered in the news, but still to this day no one will hire me or let me work. When I try to get a job, people will go out of their way to either get me fired or will damage my business prospects such as what happened with this physician assistant on Instagram: www.instagram.com/p/C8AK7qqJeoS.
I hate to equate cancel culture to going to prison, as the two are very different, but in a lot of ways it is similar and in some cases actually worse. At least when you’re done with prison, you’re free to go about your life and can expunge most convictions from your record, but being “cancelled” never ends. You can never rise above it, never apologize enough, and no matter how educated you become, or how much you grow as a human being, it will never make a difference. You can’t escape it, and most people just want to watch you suffer or hope you’ll end your own life.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
The business model we started, D.I.Y. trademarks, has never existed before. I took training programs I had developed for legal staff and attorneys, and adapted it for the public to allow people to learn how trademarks are filed by law firms at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). If people don’t have time for training, we developed technology to fill out USPTO forms for them, so they can file trademarks on their own. Lastly, we partnered with a major legal technology company, TM TKO which is used by many trademark law firms, for consumers to run their own trademark searches to see if their brand is clear for takeoff in the marketplace and at the USPTO.
What I am most proud of is bringing down the cost of trademark legal services by educating people. My goal is to educate people on all things trademarks, so they can better understand their legal needs to determine if going the route of an attorney on a trademark application is best suited for them, or if their legal risk is low, filing on their own.
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
I moved here last year from Orange County, and as you know, those living behind the Orange Curtain do not like L.A. and told me horror stories about the city. However, when I actually moved here I was pleasantly surprised. The city is so alive and each neighborhood has it’s own unique vibe and atmosphere to explore.
What I least like about the city is all the trash on the streets, the graffiti, and broken windows. There is a theory in psychology that researchers are finding more evidence to support, called “Broken Windows.” The concept goes that people “read” a neighborhood’s disorder and chaos as a sign that police are not watching and engage in crime. So, if L.A. were to clean up the streets and stop people from damaging local shops and putting up graffiti, that might go a long way to stopping larger crimes.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://sparktrademarks.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/flushotcheerleader
Image Credits
Photographer, Dasha Kozlova took these photos (https://www.instagram.com/the_1st_photography_group). However, I am the legal copyright owner: © Desirée Guerrière Townsend, 2023
