At the risk of repeating myself: when Stella was injured, McDonalds' corporate policy required coffee to be held at 180-190 deg F [1]. This is pretty well in line with the range recommended by professional coffee associations like the NCA, who currently recommend that coffee be held and served at around 180-185 deg F (~80-85 deg C) [2].
This temperature range was, and still is, used by nearly every coffee shop, restaurant, and domestic coffee machine. Starbucks regularly serves even hotter coffee. My Mr. Coffee machine holds coffee at around 185 deg F. So does your's. Look it up. And like I said, any good tea shop will serve you a pot of much hotter, nearly boiling water. Well over 200 deg F.
So if you really think McDonalds was negligent in serving coffee in compliance with recognized industry standards, then you must think every other coffee shop, tea shop, restaurant, and home coffee machine maker is also potentially guilty of negligence. Is that what you think?
Thankfully, the verdict against McDonalds in Stella's case was a pretty isolated result, and personally injury lawyers have moved on to suing over defective lids, rather than excessive temperatures [3]. Notice that in the linked case, Starbucks served 190 deg coffee, hotter than what Stella was injured by, yet they were not sued for the temperature, but rather a lid that came off too easily.
> Why would you argue that it is a binary choice between personal responsibility, or complete abrogation of responsibility?
That's the choice forced on us by frivolous lawsuits like this. Thankfully, that false choice has been thoroughly ignored, and we can still get appropriately hot coffee from establishments and our own coffee machines.
However it was also McDonald's fault.
That was the reason for sueing, and the jury agreed.
> but making the world completely safe for people who use these things carelessly would mean depriving everyone of their proper use
Why would you argue that it is a binary choice between personal responsibility, or complete abrogation of responsibility?