Comment by ElProlactin

I understand your intent, but:

> As far as consumer protection goes, the party with greater resources or sophistication (e.g., if you retain counsel against a pro se defendant or plaintiff) should have a higher standard of proof

No. Holding parties to different standards of evidence is a horrible idea and would do so much harm to a legal system that is already in many cases failing to function the way it was intended.

Determining who has "greater resources or sophistication" is itself a very thorny issue. For example, class action lawyers often look for Average Joes to become lead plaintiffs in highly-targeted lawsuits. These lawsuits are, in at least some if not many cases, designed less to defend the interests of individuals who have been harmed in some way (even theoretically) and more to extract settlements that result in hefty legal fees for themselves.

In these cases, it would be naive to treat the plaintiffs (who I would argue are proxies for the attorneys) as the parties with fewer resources or sophistication.