Abusive enforcement is a 'disproportionate' response to an alleged act of infringement. Abusive enforcement is making an arguably specious claim to the court that there is 'no other remedy under the law', carrying on about irreparable harm and incalculable damage and initiating an ex-parte proceeding (an extreme remedy and the one of last resort) against a party who has been given no' fair warning'; no cease and desist and no VeRO, no notice of any kind.
Trademark owners of course have every right to protect their marks and to enforce them within the letter and spirit of the law. The question may be put: when a mark owner has cause to believe that one of their marks is being infringed upon by another, what is an ethical, fair and measured response to the alleged infringement?
Does one begin to enforce a trademark by filing a lawsuit in Federal Court against the alleged offender? Or is there a more progressive and reasoned approach; sending a cease and desist notice and/or if the mark or marks at issue are on goods sold on eBay, by VeROing the seller causing them to take down the goods being offered for sale.
So what is a 'proportionate' response to an alleged infringement? I think that the answer becomes self evident when we examine the rights or trademark owners, the rights of the alleged infringer, the remedies available to trademerk owners and the principals of fairness and equity.