Hi there ,
I have recently joined this forum and was wondering about what I wrote above. I have been to other forums and relatively speaking , the quality of posters in general is pretty high around here.
Especially in the “Great debates” section , many posts are written quite well with rich vocabulary and well structured arguments/points. As far as I am aware , this is a “free for all” forum and there are no requisites for joining like education etc.
Any thoughts ?
Hello dude5568, welcome to the Straight Dope and aren’t you sweet! 
Seriously, I think that like many other characteristics, a more elaborate or formal writing/discussion style tends to be an outcome of self-selection among the participants.
Most people who originally peopled this forum were fans of the down-to-earth but stylistically somewhat sophisticated writing of Cecil Adams. So that style kind of propagated on the SDMB, attracting new participants who felt comfortable with it and repelling or scaring off others who didn’t enjoy it.
There’s also a certain amount of low-profile “style policing” on the boards, mostly in the form of waspish remarks when a new poster uses textspeak abbreviations or a lot of nonstandard punctuation or capitalization.
TL;DR: self-selecting, self-organizing, self-policing system.
Since opinions on this may differ, let’s move this over to IMHO.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
Thanks for the compliment in general on behalf of all board members. This board is based on The Straight Dope which is newspaper column written by the smartest person in the world, Cecil Adams, who has been fighting ignorance since 1973 with some gains, many losses and a few notable peace treaties.
The members here are his minions who have many talents and expertise of our own in almost every subject imaginable. It predates Google and is still the place to come to when you have an obscure question that cannot be answered anywhere else. We have doctors, lawyers, scientists, academics, pilots, military experts, IT professionals as well as sportos, motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, wastoids, dweebies and dickheads.
This is the place that former Jeopardy contestants come to fight among themselves and rant about simple life problems that they can’t solve. It is a unique place that only appeals to a relatively small percentage of people but is invaluable for those that do. We are the anti-Twitter.
One of the reasons that the writing level is much higher than average is because it is well moderated in general but also self-policed through peer pressure. You can write about almost anything but you have to back it up and bring citations. The board culture is very harsh on people that don’t use intelligent arguments so people that engage in that type of behavior don’t usually last long.
That said, this is not a partisan board. We have members with a full range of views on almost every subject and people are more than willing to lend their expertise to any question you have or debate you on your own views if that is what you want.
Welcome! There are sticky threads at the top of the sub-forums explaining what the general rules are and everyone is really expected to follow them. I hope you get some value out of this board like many of us do. There is no other resource on the entire web quite like it.
I think it’s a combination of terrific moderation and our mission statement. Since our goal is fighting ignorance (and making wisecracks) we can hold each other to a certain standard.
But stick around, any you’ll discover that this bar isn’t exactly astronomical. Basically, if you make a claim, you’re going to need to back it up. These aren’t dissertations though and this isn’t academia (thank bog).
In other parts of the internet if you ask somebody to back up their claims, they can tell you to flip off. That doesn’t work here. So people level up a tad.
And when, on occasion, all of the above fails, we denizens of The People’s Republic Of The Straight Dope Message Board can always rely on our Dear Jackbooted Thugs Of The Commissariat to enforce the People’s Rules And Regulations for the Communal Good Of The Whole. Or, more simply, the doofuses and dingbats who can’t follow the rulz eventually get thrown overboard.
(I’d name another very contrasting board for comparison, but that too is against the rulz.)
There are other forums? Why haven’t any of you told me this before now?
Dude, like I said, it’s against the rulz!
A lot of it is positive feedback. There are enough intelligent, interesting, and informed posters here to keep the interest of other similar posters in reading their posts, and responding to them.
Even after fifteen years I’m amazed in General Questions how often someone asks some extraordinarily esoteric questions, and someone who is an expert in the field pops in to answer it, whether it is rocket science, astrophysics, medicine, mathematics, or medieval history.
Education or aptitude tests never show who can or can’t contribute to anything; time does. From the old AOL days on, this place has stood the test of time and some of the posters have as well. But they are an odd crew always willing to make more room for anyone who wanders through. But back to your question:
As others have said, the quality of The Straight Dope. People attracted by that writing who actually stick around a while tend to be ---- well, like us; just a little more articulate about their thoughts. And also willing often to debate, and debate vigorously, but in a civilized manner. Not always but enough that it makes for an enjoyable place to share a lot of information on a very broad range of subjects. I post a fair amount – but I read 20 times more than I post. And I have learned so much that at least some of my ignorance has been fought.
May actually turn this into a Great Debate of sorts. 
OK, I’m going to say it even though I know I shouldn’t — the wisdom the Founders showed in how this was set up (the different forums) and the quality of the moderators. Do I think its all perfect? Nope; but like our government and its processes its better than anything else out there IMHO. And when I disagree I can always open a thread in ATMB and kick my thoughts around. Most places I’ve seen wouldn’t even consider allowing something like that (or the Pit). Those safety valves do more then let off pent-up emotions, they allow the rest to function as it does.
And often within mere minutes!
… and Methodists.
While annoying at times, the decision by the people in power to have an image-free board makes for a text-centric environment that most of us here seem to prefer.
So the newer subforums (gaming, game threads…) are our equivalent of the Constitutional Amendments?
I think part of the answer is that the culture of the board encourages people to write in complete sentences using proper grammar. It forces people to put a little more thought into their posts.
I single-handedly raise the average quality all on my lonesome, just by being here.
That’s why you gotta look at mean, median, and mode.
But are they always in the rear?
In whose rear? And, if Methodists are supposed to always move to the rear, does that mean they can’t hold a queue?
What’s the difference between a Baptist and a Methodist?
The Methodist will tell you “howdy” when he sees you in the liquor store.
Nah, it’s Baptists that like it in the rear.
[sub]…of the church!! They like to sit in the rear of the church!!![/sub]