but also to serve as a deterrent for companies to do something that puts their customers at risk.
So now we have to buy plastic kitchen knives because real ones are too dangerous?
Well, to be honest, knives either come sheathed, boxed in a solid holder, or not pre-sharpened, so even there there's a margin of built-in safety. Also, a knife is specifically intended and designed to cut things. Coffee is not inherently designed to scald butterfingered customers.
And it is, indeed, too much of a legal risk to facilitate reckless injury when numbskulls get involved in the equation.
Case in point: Firecrackers in my country. The only ones that can be legally purchased without a licence anymore are stuff with the explosive equivalent of a dry grasshopper. I can find better explosives in a hair salon.
But the thing is, a large number of dumbasses used them to harm people, pets and property. I for one, consider myself fairly responsible when flammable materials are concerned, and there was little that brought me joy as much as the moment I first fired a roman candle that actually had recoil into the night sky, so I bemoan the lack of such devices on the market nowadays. But still, I must agree that there was a quantifiable harm being done by them, and while this may hurt merchants and hobbyists, it's sometimes more effective to not let dumbasses have anything immediately dangerous to handle instead of forcing them to be responsible for their acts, be said dumbasses corporate entities or physical individuals.