So, tonight, I had to talk to a couple of members of staff. But I think it's a point that's important for all of us.
When you see a new article, I want you to think about the comments you make. Staff are held to a higher standard. This is because your duties include (indeed, your primary duty /is/) helping people to write better. When you post something like, "Bad tone, bad formatting, bad idea, bad so-and-so," you're not helping them. If the article's really bad, they're almost certainly new. They've read the guides, but that doesn't mean they understood everything. "Tone" and "formatting" are just words to them. Until they've seen a lot of examples, they're not going to understand what exactly went wrong.
So don't just give a laundry list of mistakes. Explain what the mistake was, and how they can fix it. Think about it from their point of view. What aren't they getting? What don't they know? Where's the disconnect?
And when you get snarky, try to make sure you put at least as much effort into being helpful as you do into sounding clever. It will also encourage the users to post that way.
And when you see someone give very good, very helpful critique? Reply saying that they've done a good thing. Reward that. People see way too many people getting pats on the back for having the snarkiest post of the week, which encourages a bunch of copycats. A lot of the time, it's obvious they don't even care that much about the article, they're just looking for ways to sound clever. If they saw positive reinforcement for being helpful, they might ape that as well.
Look, I understand, you can't go into deep thoughtful insights on every SCP that pops up. But when no one is posting any meaningful criticism, it becomes a problem. And when you start getting snarky, that's the community you build.