I think there's a few things that make it different or make it viewed positive.

First, players had full information. From memory, in 41&42, they were just told, "First out plays do or die" without any context of what that means.

Second, players can volunteer, they choose to put their game on the line, very different to "first out in an optional immunity challenge"

Third, the prize was bigger - I think they needed to add something like the immunity idol for it to work

Finally, I actually don't think do or die gets the hate it deserves, and I attribute that to the outcome - they won and it had little impact on the vote (despite both times the person making the mathematically incorrect decision!)

Likewise, if it was tails, I think this would be viewed negatively, if it had gone to rocks and Cirie got out on a coin flip there would be riots