Talk:Contributory negligence

Ambiguity

I've removed the following text. It is ambiguous (to me) as I cannot tell which "this doctrine" is (contributory negligence or comparative negligence). I've tried to edit the article to make clearer some of the development. Is there a restatement on this? And what effect has it had? Francis Davey 9 July 2005 16:45 (UTC)

The exact application of this doctrine varies from one jurisdiction to another. Most jurisdictions have abolished the doctrine altogether, instead adopting a comparative negligence standard that simply reduces the damages to be awarded by an amount reflecting the degree to which the plaintiff's negligence contributed to the injury.

U.S. states that follow this doctrine are [Alabama|Alabama], [North Carolina|North Carolina]], Maryland and Virginia. The District of Columbia also uses this doctrine as well.

External link

I suggest this link for Maryland: millerandzois.com/Contributory-Negligence-Maryland.html I am posting links from Miller & Zois which, granted, is a commerical site. But it is also the leading site on the Internet for legal education for trial lawyers - 80% of the content is focused on this direction. Please actually check out the site. The link I propose is to Maryland's contributory negligence law as a link under Maryland. This is not duplicative because it flushes out actual Maryland law. There is no promotional aspect to it, this all a part of a vast educational site. Please review the site and the content of this suggested link. Please comment pro or con and I will be glad to address it.Mike Teflon 00:47, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I will note that – educational though parts of it may be – the driving purpose of the Miller & Zois site is definitely promotional. Every 'educational' page is festooned with links to push traffic to the commercial portions of the site. (The large banner header with M&Z's name, slogan, and toll-free number; the large links across the top of each 'article' for medical malpractice, auto, truck, and motorcycle accident lawyers; the broad left-side navbar repeating the lawyer links and information about the firm; the scrolling testimonials at the bottom of the navigation links; the company name and promotional phrase again at the bottom of the article panel....) Let's call a spade a spade, shall we? There's a reason why links have been added to articles like spinal disc herniation, magnetic resonance imaging, medical malpractice.

That said, some of the M&Z content is informative despite its heavily promotional wrapper. The question in such cases is whether the 'added value' to Wikipedia provided by that content is worth the traffic (and improvement in Google PageRank) that we'll be giving to M&Z.

In this particular article, I don't believe so. Our article is sufficiently informative (in combination with last clear chance) on the topic. The M&Z page adds a few Maryland-specific dates, and a healthy dose of polemic:

The contributory negligence standard we use in Maryland is more harsh to injury victims and creates real challenges for Maryland personal injury lawyers seeks[[sic]] justice for their clients.

So--the added value isn't worth the advertising. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:23, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

How exactly is a statement of fact advertisting? While I agree polemic is a fancy word and that this is an appropriate forum for you to showoff, no one disagrees the harshness of the contributory negligence rule creates challenges for injury lawyers seeking justice. When I say no one, and I mean no one, disagrees with this assesment, not the most ardent supports of the contributory negligence rule. Moreover, I'm a law professor. I get paid to teach. Does this destroy the value of the contribution? Of course not. And it does not on here, either. I appreciate that you try to addresss these issues in the ends on what you believe to be the merits. And while I disagree with your conclusion, I do not disrespect the analysis. All of the "calling a spade a spade" junk before is simply not relevant but does meet its intended purpose: to be inflamatory. Mike Teflon 01:56, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I did not intend to suggest that the framed content – the article text – is advertising. If anyone got that impression, I regret any lack of clarity in my remarks. Rather, the advertising is everywhere on the pages except in the framed articles. Miller & Zois aren't putting up these pages solely out of the goodness of their hearts; they certainly hope for some return on their investment. The content – some of which is quite useful, by the way – comes wrapped in a heavy dose of M&Z promotional material. (There's nothing wrong with M&Z wanting to find new clients or advertise their services. They're a business, and this is what they do.)

My point is simply that since there is no way to present the article without the surrounding material, we have to decide on a case by case basis whether or not the M&Z pages are likely to be of net benefit to Wikipedia. Does a given M&Z article provide enough new, supplementary information or source material likely to be of interest to a Wikipedia reader to be worth subjecting that same reader to the advertising all around the page?

It is also widely known that having a link from Wikipedia tends to dramatically increase a webpage or site's Google PageRank. While I don't believe that Mike Teflon's intent is related to search engine optimization, I am concerned about the addition (by Mike and other editors) of M&Z links to articles like slipped disc and MRI: web search terms with which a personal injury firm would like to be associated in Google searches. Wikipedia editors don't like to feel like we're being used—consequently we're hesitant about linking to sites that contain a substantial amount of promotional content or links.

About my use of the word 'polemic'—that might have been a bit heavy. Nevertheless, I read the article as advancing a strong bias against contributory negligence as an absolute defence. (For what it's worth, I agree with the position that contributory negligence is seldom 'fair' when employed as an absolute defence—but that is irrelevant to our discussion here.) Words and phrasing are chosen to elicit sympathy for a position against this defence. To take a few examples, the word 'victim' is used frequently and preferentially as a synonym for plaintiff; the rule is twice described as 'harsh' in its effect on those 'victims'; there's the passage quoted above suggesting that the contributory negligence defence is an impediment to 'justice'. The bias of the M&Z article isn't particularly important here, however—my concern was about the relative lack of additional material above and beyond our articles here sufficient to justify directing our readers to a heavily branded promotional site. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 04:45, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Removal of content

This edit removed a fair bit. The information wasn't referenced, but it might be correct. II | (t - c) 00:04, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Australia

This discussion seems to be describing comparative, not contributory negligence. Even if a determination of 100% comparative negligence is made, it is not an example of contributory negligence where a smaller percentage completely bars recovery. Unless there exists an example in Australia (past or present), then this section should be removed. Rkedge (talk) 12:02, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Merge with "comparative negligence"

The topics are closely connected, both articles cover the overlap, and they're often confused in common parlance.

And see discussion in "Ambiguity" above. S C Cheese (talk) 17:08, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

To me it makes more sense to consider merging both Contributory negligence and Comparative negligence into the general negligence article. In my opinion, they don't otherwise pair well. The resultant article would not be excessive in length, and at least on initial consideration it seems like the best way to present the concepts in an understandable manner. Arllaw (talk) 23:08, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that would work well. S C Cheese (talk) 15:09, 26 January 2023 (UTC)