Many people that lack merit really have no wish to create content in order to contribute to the forum, but rather get away with a quick merit and be off to posting for their signature campaign. What is more important is to have the right mindset, and maintain a contributive will there on. That requires time and effort which, unfortunately, is not amongst many posters priorities.
It's true that people don't really look in their ownself and make a checklist and point down their mistakes and decide whether they can really overcome them or need to deal with them. It's good to paper out things as it helps to know ourselves better. Few posters who don't know better English, have merits through local posts but I've even seen many shitposters spamming the local boards as well because there's no spanky level of moderation in those boards. So, instead of watching out for merits, it's extremely necessary for these newbies to please take into account what they're best at, and as well excel more through learning because nobody here would have been eligible to earn but their skills and abilities are what keeps them out of the box, as they outsmart others and get rewarded - be it in merits or BTC (signature campaigns).