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Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl
I'm totally lost, but I must defer to the jugement of my betters. Can you explain more?
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Judgment of your betters? C'mon man. All I was doing is commenting on your statement that jury awards for punitive damages aren't the basis for our system of justice. I feel they must be or such things would not be allowed. Is that a wrong assessment?
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The cup never caused burns. Also, it is assumed that people won't spill what they know is a boiling liquid onto themselves and would take proper precautions. If they didn't, why allow any liquid in any container whatsoever to be raised to a harmful temperature?
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But it's NOT supposed to be boiling liquid. It's supposed to be a cup of drinkable coffee. If a person can't get the lid off without the cup failing then it is indeed an issue, or at least a jury of her peers thought so.
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And McDonalds still serves coffee in styrofoam containers today. That wasn't the issue. The issue was that Liebeck's case implied that she didn't know that the coffee would burn her, causing her to handle it inappropriately. That is why larger warning labels were adopted, as well as a lower temperature.
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Right, the important part being they lowered the temperature to a level that won't cause 3rd degree burns. And actually MD now serves it's coffee in laminated cardboard cups which are a lot less likely to crumble and crack.
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The only issue here was personal accountability, and that has been destroyed by the judgement. Liebeck was not the first to misuse a product in a way harmful to herself, despite clear instructions and common sense, but she reinforced the precedent that nobody is responsible for anything they do with a product.
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She took the lid off to put in condiments. You call that misuse?
The bottom line here is all she wanted was help with her medical bills, which if you've been following the news are ridiculously high. MD chose to offer her $800 instead. Now I think it's obvious that she wasn't out to score a payday. Had they just done right by their customer it would have saved them hundreds of thousands of dollars.