"Hot" is meaningless in this context. People take "hot" showers and it turns their skin red, it doesn't cause serious burns that require surgery. You can absolutely blame someone else if the coffee you spilled on yourself was served at dangerous temperatures. Also, you can't "see" that it is dangerously hot before it's too late. A lot of things have steam coming off of them and don't require hospitilization if you spill it on yourself.
Well, when I buy coffee or tea, I usually can feel how hot it is by touching the cup. My local coffee shop serves it super hot, so I take the lid off and blow on it until it cools down. It simply would not occur to me to sue them if I injured myself with their hot coffee. I prefer it hot in any case, since you can cool down super hot coffee pretty easily. As I said, I’m not commenting on the legal case. The woman could have very well had a viable case. I’m commenting on the culture.
