Danger! Contents Hot!

Everyone remembers the 1994 ruling where the old lady got $2.8 million for spilling McDonalds hot coffee which caused burns. Well, someone recently decided to try it with Starbucks.

This got me thinking...how stupid have we as a society become? Yes, coffee is hot unless you're one of those weird people putting ice in it! Gross! The lid isn't threaded and watertight. It's a cheap $.000001 chunk of plastic. Bad things happen.

Anyway, I can see suing someone if the employee forgot to include a lid, or poured it in a cup with a hole in the bottom. Even then, use some common sense.

How long until someone actually gets paid again even though there is already a warning on the cup? They'll say the print size is too small, or wasn't written in braille.

You can't regulate stupidity. The world is full of people that find ways around every measure you put into place to keep them from becoming injured.

Recent example was the zoo where the mother had a two year old stand in the top of a moat observation fence for cheetah's. She, the mother lost her grip and the child fell in. Minor injuries from the fall, but if the cat had attacked, the zoo or local PD would have killed the cat.

Common sense prevailed and the mother was charged with child endangerment.

Stupid people shouldn't be able to reproduce. rant off

you talking about a cop who spilled free coffe on him, than went home to take pics before going to er? well he lost the case. he was not even asking for rmuch, just 50k.

about mcd case, it was not as simple as it looks, yes she had burned her self badly, but it was not the first time it happened with mcd, investigations show mcd keeps coffe at higher temp, than others, people burned badly with their coffie before, this was not so much about awarding her, but to punish mcd for ignoring the issue. i've read about somewhere years ago, if i find i'll post a link.
but if you want to talk stupid lawsuites look up vinebago suite.

just to add a bit of background info regarding the McDonalds case:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald's_Restaurants

"The trial took place from August 8–17, 1994, before New Mexico District Court Judge Robert H. Scott.[16] During the case, Liebeck's attorneys discovered that McDonald's required franchisees to hold coffee at 180–190 °F (82–88 °C). At 190 °F (88 °C), the coffee would cause a third-degree burn in two to seven seconds. Liebeck's attorney argued that coffee should never be served hotter than 140 °F (60 °C), and that a number of other establishments served coffee at a substantially lower temperature than McDonald's. Liebeck's lawyers presented the jury with evidence that 180 °F (82 °C) coffee like that McDonald's served may produce third-degree burns (where skin grafting is necessary) in about 12 to 15 seconds. Lowering the temperature to 160 °F (71 °C) would increase the time for the coffee to produce such a burn to 20 seconds. Liebeck's attorneys argued that these extra seconds could provide adequate time to remove the coffee from exposed skin, thereby preventing many burns. McDonald's claimed that the reason for serving such hot coffee in its drive-through windows was that those who purchased the coffee typically were commuters who wanted to drive a distance with the coffee; the high initial temperature would keep the coffee hot during the trip.[2] However, the company's own research showed that some customers intend to consume the coffee immediately while driving.[3]

Other documents obtained from McDonald's showed that from 1982 to 1992 the company had received more than 700 reports of people burned by McDonald's coffee to varying degrees of severity, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000.[2] McDonald's quality control manager, Christopher Appleton, testified that this number of injuries was insufficient to cause the company to evaluate its practices. He argued that all foods hotter than 130 °F (54 °C) constituted a burn hazard, and that restaurants had more pressing dangers to warn about. The plaintiffs argued that Appleton conceded that McDonald's coffee would burn the mouth and throat if consumed when served.[17]"

I'm going to sue (not sure who) about the speed limit. Changing it to 65mph from 70mph will give me more time to react. Then someone can argue 60mph from 65mph...etc....etc.

society is constantly adjusting its opinion on what it thinks is hazardous behavior.

Some behavior seems to be obviously and intrinsicly dangerous, and people seem to be okay with that. Using a sharp knife to cut an apple clearly carries some risk of injury, but most folks learn how to use a knife after one or two minor incidents. Other people never get comfortable using a sharp knife and avoid them (I'm thinking of one family member in particular).

Other activities seem intrinsicly dangerous until we figure out a way to make them less dangerous. Think of safety glass in cars, seat belts, tubeless tires (or whatever tire technology made them much less prone to failure than they used to be), collapsible steering columns, energy absorbing structures, airbags, etc. Maybe include the change from drum brakes to disc brakes?

As a product manufacturer, there are risks if you ignore the trends in attitudes towards safety. Yeah.. it's expensive to do all of the safety and regulatory testing, but it's also expensive to get invited to explain to the judge or jury why your product is causing injuries and similar products aren't.

On a personal note, my brother in law recently got a new table saw with the SawStop feature:
http://www.sawstop.com/
It's a bit pricey, but probably cheaper than going to the emergency room to try to get your finger reattached (assuming that you can find it and clean the sawdust out of it).
I know at least two people who've lost fingers or tips when using power tools. I assume that the day will come when all saws will come with this sort of auto-stop feature.

Yeah it's almost funny (not that people got hurt) looking back in time at the things people did and how some products worked. I sure it will be the same 40 years from now, though.

I bought a sunshade for my front windshield. It actually has a warning label attached to it that says, "Do not drive with sunshade in place."

Stupid is as stupid does, and that will never change. Greatly compounding the problem are personal injury lawsuits where juries award the doer of stupid vast amounts of money. The costs of these awards are pasted on to every consumer. Next time you're at one of the big box stores check out the ladder section. Read the warning labels and the prices.

I remember reading about a farmer who had been working on his barn. Seems he placed a ladder on frozen cow manure. The next day the weather warmed thawing the "pie". The ladder sunk. The farmer fell. The farmer sued the ladder manufacturer and won big-time. The jury decided the ladder company should have had a warning on its product that indicated thawing manure wasn't a safe surface on which to place the ladder.

I also read of a woman in a hospital who, breaking hospital rules, set herself on fire while sneaking a smoke in bed. Yep, she fell asleep. The jury decided the hospital should have done more to keep her from smoking.

~ Chance

The problem is that we live in a litigious society. The lawyers twist everything to the point that common sense no longer applies. Because of this our legal system is slowed to a crawl, and our insurance rates are sky high.
cases such as the mcdonalds coffee should be thrown out, and the lawyer and client should have been charged court costs.
Hot coffee doesn't brew below a certain temperature.

jabe1 said:

The problem is that we live in a litigious society. The lawyers twist everything to the point that common sense no longer applies. Because of this our legal system is slowed to a crawl, and our insurance rates are sky high.
cases such as the mcdonalds coffee should be thrown out, and the lawyer and client should have been charged court costs.
Hot coffee doesn't brew below a certain temperature.

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I could have the wrong recollection of this case, but didn't the woman place the cup between her legs when the lid came off spilling the coffee on her? Nope I was correct. She placed the Styrofoam cu between her legs and split the coffee on herself.

http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm

Some info in the Wiki cite differs from the law website.

yea she did. it was 20% her fault, as per jury, she also opened the cup while still holding it between her legs

jabe1 said:

The problem is that we live in a litigious society. The lawyers twist everything to the point that common sense no longer applies.

Click to expand...

It's not just the lawyers... I've known a lot people best described as "trailer trash". Maybe it's better to say that they are poorly educated with low incomes and no salable skills and a lower than average IQ. Nah, I lived in a a trailer park, for gawd's sake! But I digress.

Virtually every one of these acquaintances from the lower socio economic level would gleefully speak of lawsuits anytime they felt that they'd been wronged by a company or person who was better off. They would actually gloat over the fortune that they would be getting for a scratched fender.

I'd like to start a consulting business so that I could be called as an expert witness on the subject of stupidity. You see, there ARE people who would drive their car with the sun shade in the windshield. The problem is that if you are stupid enough to do that, you are already too stupid to pay attention to the warnings. As an Expert Witness, I could explain that to juries.

Dan

I bought a bottle of spray eyeglass cleaner once. It came with a warning on the bottle that said remove glasses before spraying.

+

On bags of Peanuts it says: Warning, contains Peanuts







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^ I've seen this on peanut butter as well.

First off, if they can't be bothered to read the large print on the front indicating it's a peanut product, they probably won't read the tiny print on the back with the allergen warning.

Second, and most importantly, if someone has a peanut allergy and then digs into a tub of peanut butter anyways, they are too dumb to live and probably deserve whatever they get. Stop absolving people of all personal responsibility for their actions!!!

Mr. Peanut hires lawyer that advises him to put warning label on jar of peanut butter.

Guy eats peanut butter, hires lawyer to sue Mr. Peanut Butter's company.

Peanut Company lawyer wasn't interested in absolving guy of his foolish behavior, he was trying to protect Mr. Peanut's bread and butter.

~ Chance

Because of stupidity and people just trying to make a buck, these frivolous law suits will never stop.

LGT said:

Because of stupidity and people just trying to make a buck, these frivolous law suits will never stop.

Click to expand...

Exactly. If the Mr. Peanut case gets thrown out and the judge calls out the guy for being an idiot and eating a product he knows he is allergic to, it will discourage other people from doing stupid things with the goal of suing the company. Maybe not immediately, but over time. Obviously there are times when a company is a fault for selling dangerous, defective, mislabeled etc. products and should be liable for damages. But consumers need to still use their God given brain to use products safely and avoid things they are not equipped to use, allergic to, etc. It's not everyone else' responsibility to protect you every moment of the day from doing something stupid to yourself.

A big reason we have these frivolous lawsuits is the contingent fees the lawyers get. If they win, they get a nice % off the top. So the lawyers don't care if the idiot did something stupid. They care about the sympathy the victim will get from the jury. It's even worse for class action cases. They don't have to specifically identify all the victims. If they win, they get their % off the top, pay the victims they did identify and then make more money trying to find other victims. The latest trend is for law firms to pool resources and go after companies. Pooling resources spreads the risk and the upside if they win, is too good to pass up.