With the Oscars right around the corner we thought we’d discuss a little known fact about those tiny little gold statues everyone gets given, by which we mean, tell you about the fact no one is allowed to sell them.

Yep, despite the fact the person winning one should, by all rights be able to do whatever the hell they want with an Oscar statuette, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (henceforth shortened to AMPAS because we don’t like typing it out over and over again) has strict rules in place to stop an actor, director or indeed anyone who might win an Oscar from selling their statuette.

Apparently before they’re even allowed to collect their statuette, the winner must sign a special contract stating that neither them or their kin or relatives can sell the statuette without first offering to selling it back to the AMPAS for a single American dollar. As you can imagine, the AMPAS is never going to say no to the offer to line its vaults with old Oscars and no person in their right mind is going to sell a treasured family heirloom for a dollar.

The thing is, not everyone knows about this, just consider Cyrus Todd, a young man who, upon encountering financial troubles tried to sell his grandfather’s Oscar from 30 years prior. As soon as the AMPAS heard about this they immediately slapped Todd with a bunch of legal litigation for trying to sell the one thing in his life worth money so that he could afford to live. Purely so that they could bully him into selling it to them for a dollar.

The weird thing is, according to law experts, if a person sold a statuette, the only thing the AMPAS would be entitled to would be the cost of the loss of the statue, which would, hilariously, only be a single dollar. However, since the kind of people trying to sell an Oscar statuette seem to be people who are really down on their luck without a pot to piss in, the chances of this argument being used in court a slim to none.

So when you’re watching the Oscars this year, just remember one thing, the people behind them wouldn’t think twice about viciously suing the crap out of any of the winner’s relatives if they ever fell on hard times, because that is how you reward people for their contribution to film.