I am quickly approaching 50 years of old age. I sometimes ask myself, “You old fool, what have you learned?”
The answer is usually “not much,” but I have picked up a thing or two and here is one I will share with you:
Be a sceptic. Accept nothing at face value.
You might say, “You old fool, you are cynic, not a sceptic.”
I disagree. You see, many malevolent forces are busily at work constantly undermining your humanity in order to get another .0009% return on their investments. Interest is not always paid in dollars or power, but that is usually a good place to start looking for motive.
Let me give you an example. At a family dinner, we got to talking about politics, law, business, etc, and my nephew made the comment that people shouldn’t be allowed to make frivolous lawsuits. Hmmm! That’s in the news, right? Tort reform this and tort reform that. Interesting! What does a 15 year-old care about tort-reform? Why isn’t he talking about girls and baseball instead?
He cited, as an example, the McDonalds coffee scalding case. Now, everybody knows the facts of that case. A crazy old lady spilled coffee on herself and was awarded millions and millions of dollars for her own foolishness. Who wouldn’t be for tort reform after they’ve heard that story?
But I wondered about that story, so I googled “McDonald’s coffee scalds woman case” and read up on it. I read multiple accounts from different sources and there are several fun facts which are not in dispute:
- As a matter of policy, McDonald’s sold its coffee at 180 to 190 degrees Fahrenheit. Coffee at that temperature, if spilled, causes third-degree burns (the skin is burned away down to the muscle/fatty-tissue layer) in two to seven seconds.
- McDonald’s admitted that it has known about the risk of serious burns from its scalding hot coffee for more than 10 years—the risk was brought to its attention through numerous other claims and suits, to no avail.
- McDonald’s admitted that its coffee is “not fit for consumption” when sold because it causes severe scalds if spilled or drunk.
- McDonald’s witnesses testified that it did not intend to turn down the heat.
- The 79 year-old woman (Stella Liebeck of Albuquerque, New Mexico) was in the passenger seat of her grandson’s car (not driving, as commonly reported) when she was severely burned by McDonald’s coffee in February 1992.
- She suffered third-degree burns over 16 percent of her body, necessitating hospitalization for eight days, whirlpool treatment for debridement of her wounds, skin grafting, scarring, and disability for more than two years.
- The treating physician testified that her injury was one of the worst scald burns he had ever seen.
- The medical bills were $11,000.
- She offered to settle the case for $20,000.
- McDonalds offered her $800, so the case went to court.
- The jury awarded Liebeck $200,000 in compensatory damages. (This amount was reduced to $160,000 because the jury found Liebeck 20 percent at fault in the spill.)
- The jury also awarded Liebeck $2.7 million in punitive damages, which equals about two days of McDonald’s coffee sales.
- The trial court subsequently reduced the punitive award to $480,000—or three times compensatory damages—even though the judge called McDonald’s conduct reckless, callous and willful. Subsequent to remittitur, the parties entered a post-verdict settlement.
- Post-verdict investigation found that the temperature of coffee at the local Albuquerque McDonald’s had dropped to 158 degrees Fahrenheit.
It has been said that people are not controlled by government, laws, or even logic—but by the stories they are told. Who tells you your stories?
