I doubt it too.  I sure as hell wouldn't buy any merits, not even for bragging rights--it just doesn't matter that much to me since I don't need them to rank up any further.  I didn't suck Foxpup off, either, by the way.  He's apparently just a fan of my posts.

OP, I'd be curious to know what posts you're talking about.  Can you quote them or something if you can't post an image?  I do agree that there are many posts made by higher-ranked members that get merited, and the quality of said posts is iffy.  It just happens from time to time, and it's not exclusive to Hero and Legendary ranks. 

People give merits for all sorts of different reasons, so I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that there's anything suspicious about it when it happens.  I've merited posts that were just memes, and I've merited very short posts if they made me laugh or if I strongly agreed with them.  I try not to do that anymore, but if you looked through my meriting history, you'd be sure to find examples of posts that you'd likely think didn't deserve to be merited.

Yeah, it probably is too low.  On the other hand, at least those campaigns have a merit requirement--there's no obligation for a manager to require a particular number of merits, and it's a good thing when they do.