A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the encroachment of Stupidity (with a capital “S”) into our society.
My main target was the fact that a local grocery-store chain has changed the signs at the express lane from “15 Items” to “Around 15 Items.” I was stunned that the chain appeared to be siding with the handful of jackasses and morons who willingly and selfishly screw things up for the vast majority who do things the right way, take other people’s feelings into consideration, and can count up to 15.
I got a huge response on the column, not all of it favorable. Many took me to task for an offhanded comment I made while setting up my main gripe (more on that later), but, astonishingly, three people actually wrote in favor of the new signs.
Janet writes that the new signs are an improvement. “It’s asinine to have to count your items to make sure you qualify for the quick lane, or have somebody else count them for you and inform you that you’re over the limit. It lets people decide for themselves if they should go in the fast lane or not.”
Well, Janet, I hope that when you die (a long time from now), you end up in purgatory, a place full of people with bad body odor, flies and air conditioning that doesn’t work. (Wow, I just realized that purgatory sounds a lot like Houston.) Anyway, you’re in purgatory because of a couple of clerical errors. (Somehow, a couple of Tea Party members got into heaven and forced St. Peter to downsize his staff.) You want to get things cleared up as quickly as possible, so you head over to the line that reads “5 Transgressions or Fewer.” But when you get in line, you see that standing in line ahead of you are a couple of Mideast dictators, a bunch of tax accountants and Charlie Sheen.
Most of the negative e-mails pertained to my having referred to the famous McDonald’s coffee-spill lady as “stupid.” Many people suggested that I didn’t know the details of the case and recommended that I watch the documentary Hot Coffee. (You can read a couple of them in this week’s Mailbag online.)
I had already seen that documentary, but I went back and watched it again in case I had missed anything. Like all good documentarians, Hot Coffee director Susan Saladoff took a clear stance on an issue and then presented items to help make her case. She certainly made a good case against so-called tort reform, although I must admit that I, like most reasonable people, still do a full-body wince when I hear about some guy who was drunk and high, crashed into a telephone pole, and then successfully sued some governmental entity because the telephone pole didn’t get out of his way.
So that y’all know that I know the facts of the case, I’ll present them briefly:
• Stella Liebeck, 79, was the passenger in a car, and she got a cup of coffee from a McDonald’s drive-through in Albuquerque, N.M. (It was not in Tucson, as one of you suggested.)
• She put the cup of scalding liquid between her legs and attempted to pry off the lid so that she could add cream and sugar. (The car she was in didn’t have a cup-holder.)
• The coffee spilled, causing third-degree burns to her thighs and private area.
• She asked McDonald’s to cover her medical costs. When the company refused, she sued, and the jury awarded her a ton of money. A judge later reduced the award by more than 80 percent, and she settled out of court for an undisclosed amount. (I assume the jurors looked at the graphic pictures of her injuries and thought, “Wow, that coulda been me.”)
A lot of you made a point of mentioning that the coffee had been brewed and served at 185 degrees. Well, I looked it up, and according to the National Coffee Association (which has been around for more than 100 years), coffee should be brewed at between 195 and 205 degrees, and served at 175 degrees.
I’m in no way a fan of corporate-think, but in some cases, I understand it. McDonald’s could have paid for her medical bills, but it probably would have swung the door open for a lot of other time- and money-consuming complaints. I’m sorry that she got hurt, but in my mind, an elderly woman voluntarily placed a cup of hot liquid between her legs and then sued somebody after getting burned by liquid she had voluntarily placed between her legs. I don’t get it.
As I was doing research for this, I came across an item about a 23-year-old schoolteacher from Illinois who went to a Halloween party at a Chicago hotel in 2010. After drinking herself drunk, she attempted to slide down a fourth-story banister and fell to her death. Now her parents are suing the hotel and the party’s promoters. It’s sad that she died, but how is that anybody’s fault but hers?
And finally, for Allan H., who wrote and claimed that McDonald’s “has probably killed more people than Hitler,” you’re banned from the Guy Club forever.
This article appears in Aug 9-15, 2012.
Thank you Tucson Weekly/Tom. I regret to inform you, with all due respect because I love you (agape) and Tucson Weekly. The place had been warned before about the temperature and ignored the rules. Hence, third degree burns. Ralph Nader exposed this many yrs. ago. but it’s cool (not the coffee) please no one should ever put any suffering (insert here) to what that inglorious Bastard did. I can’t even say his name. Always there to tweak things a tad. Fact Tom and I still read your column:)
And another thing, Tom – there are deep philosophical implications about the 15 item line. For example, does a dozen eggs count as one or 12 items??!? And if someone happens to end up with 16 items, and later runs for POTUS, the press will inevitably find out about the transgression and rag on it for weeks. And finally, if the store lets someone through with 16 items, can I sue the store – out of moral indignity and outrage, or course – and make a pile of dough?
Tom/Tucson weekly, think Seinfeld, why not show a picture of oneself when expressing a p.o.v. who are these people in the shadows? funny, weird, wacky stuff…:) full disclosure overt style not covert style is the style:)
Couldn’t agree more, Tom. The supermarket is at fault because their limit is over 10. That’s more fingers than most people have. So they are probably not able to accurately count what is in their basket. The stupidity thing also extends to package directions. There are usage directions on toothpaste, mouthwash, and shampoo. I’m sure some lawyer tells the manufacturer that they need to put the directions on the package or the consumer will try to eat the whole tube of toothpaste or drink the shampoo.
And I don’t care what the weasel-deal is with the hot coffee law suit, anybody old enough to drive a car, knows that hot coffee is , well, hot and it is a bad idea to pour it on your lap. They say that the US ranks about #25 in educational achievement worldwide. Your article seems to bear it out.
Big business would love to rewrite the rules with tort reform so that they couldn’t be sued by anybody for anything, much less idiots like the coffee-spill lady. Safeway would love it if people actually heeded any sign whatsoever in or around the store (my ignored favorite, parking lot stop signs). And it doesn’t end there. Half the customers in the store cannot decipher the expiration date on their coupons, they cannot make heads or tails over simple instructions like “limit 2 per customer”, and stores would really, really love it if customers actually had their payment ready when they get in line to check out. We put up with these morons because the alternative is onerous. I think the best way for a store to deal with miscreants is to simply deny them service, soup nazi style; “No groceries for you”, scrape their items into a bin at the end of the check-out counter, “Next”.
Two things, Tom.
1) You actually get paid to write this inane jibberish ?! I hope you at least have the decency to wear a condum when you pick up your check as you’re screwing the Weekly but good.
2) What is it with you and the Tea Party ? Did a member convert your daughter to conservatism? Perhaps one of us peed in your cornflakes and you found out after you ate them? The former being worse than the latter. Maybe it’s just a liberal thing.
As much as I agree with the premise of your argument, your examples about the coffee and the express lane seem to reinforce that stupidity…no offense.
If a business is creating a problem, there are very few ways consumers can influence that business to change their ways. In the coffee scenario, the extremely large jury award was meant to influence McDonald’s to fix a dangerous condition that was created by their product, not to reward the “stupidity” of a woman accidentally spilling coffee on herself after McDonald’s knowingly poured almost boiling coffee into a cup with a improperly fitting lid.
In your grocery scenario, there is a super easy fix for this situation: stop going to that store. As far as I know, it’s not the customer’s job to police the checkout lanes for the number of items someone has in their basket. If you really care, then vote with your feet. That is another way consumers can influence a business.
What is stupid is when consumers see a problem or are screwed by a business and do nothing about it. At least you wrote an article.
Oh, the highly-colored chewproduct that is CW fires both barrels of inanity once again…
Where were you last week for the gun debate? You missed a good one. Some guy named Allan Bartlett bragged about using his loaded penis on my deceased mother. Even you might find that a little over the edge. I thought the attic door got stuck and you couldn’t get out.
Listen, I don’t care what the circumstances are; temperature, cup/lid size, ect., ect., if you open a HOT cup of coffee on your lap, in a car, in a fast food drive-thru lane, you’re a f*cking moron. No one knows the exact temperature of the coffee they’re drinking at any given moment, whether they brewed it themselves or purchased it somewhere else, but we all know it’s….wait for it…….HOT, so that argument is irrelevant. It’s called common sense. The same goes for the 15 items or less lane in the grocery store. If you’re just running in to grab milk, bread, eggs, condoms, lube & some Pepcid AC, the 15 & under lane is for you. If you’re doing you’re weekly food stamp/WIC haul, the 15 & under lane is not for you. Simple. If you have 15 items & decide to grab some Tic Tacs at the registers, no one is going to make a fuss, but if you obviously have 20+ things in your cart, you should be drawn & quartered at dawn, make that skinned alive then burned at the stake if you’re one of those GD obnoxious “couponers” & proceed to write a check….
I sympathize with your irritation at the, “Around 15 items,” business but I expect the grocery store people tire of seeing epic battles being fought in the check-out line over no. 16, a pack of Tic-Tacs. I myself rigorously adhere to the under 15 rule — to the point where I agonize over the status of, “two for one,” items. I will read the Supreme Court’s decision on this matter with considerable interest.
So you say – that comment’s been removed, what’s to complain about?
May you leave this world the same way she did.
Not enough chlorine in the gene pool it would seem.
You liberals are so crazy. If you don’t like a store’s policies, goods, or services then don’t go there. There’s zillions of places to buy groceries. Stop whining like little girls and find a supermarket that you like better. If the item limit in a grocery store has you weeping yourself to sleep at night, then find one that strictly adheres to item limits if that’s your thing.
A reminder, folks, that comments made by people who use fake email addresses will be deleted. Thanks for reading, and I recommend reviewing the comments policy–a link to which appears above the comments box.