Quote Originally Posted by billyjeff2 View Post
It wasn't a question of serving hot vs. lukewarm coffee. Rather, it was a question of McDonald's serving coffee at a temperature close to the boiling point, which is hot enough to cause 2nd-3rd degree burns, vs hot that is hot, but not dangerously so. If the coffee was hot enough to cause serious burns to the woman's genitalia (ouch! double ouch!!) it was also hot enough to cause similar burns to one's mouth/tongue/throat tissues. I remember getting coffee from McDonald's years ago, and you always had to let it cool off before you could drink it. As was pointed out by others, McDonald brewed and served their coffee back then at very high temperatures not because consumers wanted to drink coffee hot enough to sear the skin off their lips, but because they were able to extract more coffee per pound of beans and therefore made more money. And they had been repeatedly warned about the danger of doing so That they chose to ignore the warnings was one of the reasons they were hit with punitive damages when they forced the case to go to trial. And BTW-the jury award was significantly reduced on appeal. Anyone hear willing to take "X" amount of dollars in exchange for having 2nd-3rd degree burns to their groin area?
And as far as the post about the burglar who sued--that's not a true story. It's one of those internet urban legends that's often packaged with the McDonald's story under the title of "Stella Awards" (the plaintiff in the McDonald's case was named Stella), purportedly a collection of outrageous lawsuits designed to highlight absurdities in our judicial system.

Only problem: most if not all of the "cases" cited in the "Stella Awards" are untrue.
Best to fact check them first before quoting them....

Fair enough. That's a much better, and more mature, argument against McDonald's than I've seen so far. I still feel most of the fault lies with the person who spilled the coffee, but I can also see the points against McDonald's. Always could (well, at least after reading the precis contained in the link), but it still strikes me as the person who spilled, rather than the entity's which provided, responsibility. Perhaps my response was a knee-jerk reaction against a nanny-state mentality. I realize that wasn't the case here, but so many things seem to be. Oh, well...people won't agree on everything. Certainly the jury was in possession of more facts in this case than I was, so it would be improper of me, who is not, to second guess them.