It is a brand new, $1000 consumer device. As haughty and rich as we all present ourselves, it really supremely sucks if you're the person whose brand new device got bent -- regardless of your available spending cash, it's a major bummer, moreso if you have a 2 year contract ahead of you and a dead device. That is why there is a "hysteria".

Gorilla glass (not sure if the iPhone uses that brand specifically, but they use ion enhanced glass which is what it is) famously bends.

This story got knocked back to page 3 for having too many comments to upvotes, as an aside.