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I don't know if it is fair to say people "misremembered" the details of the McDonald's coffee lawsuit. As the news media and pop culture weirdly seemed to go ou

by dfxm12 2y ago

I don't know if it is fair to say people "misremembered" the details of the McDonald's coffee lawsuit. As the news media and pop culture weirdly seemed to go out of their way to paint McDonald's as the victim and the woman as negligent, people never knew the correct details at the time to begin with.

burningChrome 2y ago
I was a college student at the time and never saw it that way. I remember in the media there were vigorous debates over this as being "frivolous" but I remember all my friends were on the victims side. Spending days in the hospital to get skin grafting because their coffee was too hot I think far exceeded what someone would classify as "frivolous". I also remember several news reports about how they found out through court documents McDonald's had over 700 reports of burns between 1982-1992 which to me was completely shocking and proved they knew their coffee was way too hot. Now you see all the warnings on the labels, most of the bigger chains have cardboard sleeves so your hands don't get too hot holding it. McDonald's has since reduced the temperature of their coffee as well. The only thing I didn't accurately remember was several people told me that the lady initially won her lawsuit, but lost on appeal and McDonald's didn't have to pay her anything. In actuality, she won a sizeable award from the jury, but it was greatly reduced by the judge and then before an appeal, McDonald's finally settled out of court. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restaurants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restau...
gosub100 2y ago
The media also follow trends. I remember all through the '90s there was a trend of reporting frivolous cases as news, probably for sensationalist purposes. The ones I remembered were "prisoner sues because his ice cream melted", burglar sues after falling out of rafters". These type of stories were popular on morning radio programs. What I want to know is if Ms Liebeck just got lumped into that fad, or if there was economic pressure from McD's to weaken her case. McDonald's advertising spend was HUGE back then, of course on the same media channels that reported about her.

by dfxm12 2y ago

burningChrome 2y ago

I was a college student at the time and never saw it that way. I remember in the media there were vigorous debates over this as being "frivolous" but I remember all my friends were on the victims side. Spending days in the hospital to get skin grafting because their coffee was too hot I think far exceeded what someone would classify as "frivolous". I also remember several news reports about how they found out through court documents McDonald's had over 700 reports of burns between 1982-1992 which to me was completely shocking and proved they knew their coffee was way too hot. Now you see all the warnings on the labels, most of the bigger chains have cardboard sleeves so your hands don't get too hot holding it. McDonald's has since reduced the temperature of their coffee as well. The only thing I didn't accurately remember was several people told me that the lady initially won her lawsuit, but lost on appeal and McDonald's didn't have to pay her anything. In actuality, she won a sizeable award from the jury, but it was greatly reduced by the judge and then before an appeal, McDonald's finally settled out of court. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restaurants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restau...

gosub100 2y ago

The media also follow trends. I remember all through the '90s there was a trend of reporting frivolous cases as news, probably for sensationalist purposes. The ones I remembered were "prisoner sues because his ice cream melted", burglar sues after falling out of rafters". These type of stories were popular on morning radio programs. What I want to know is if Ms Liebeck just got lumped into that fad, or if there was economic pressure from McD's to weaken her case. McDonald's advertising spend was HUGE back then, of course on the same media channels that reported about her.