Indeed. So either we shrug and don't bother about a childish minority - which is what I've been doing all along - or aknowledge this so called "problem" and do something about it. If that's the case, there's only two options: the community starts acting mature all of a sudden, or the root of the problem is removed completely.
Remove post ratings visible on profile pages, perhaps keep only the 'staff pick' rating visible. If you wouldn't see your ratings everyday, those young kids wouldn't play 'Who has more' and making posts wouldn't be just a rating collector visible on their profile page. It would just mean that their post is worth a 'Like' 'Agree' or 'Informative' anywhere on the forums if they post something.
I said this last time a debate about post ratings came up, i may as well repeat it: add the ability for a thread owner/mderator to enable or disable different ratings on one specific thread. so, for example, on the community screenshots, or "beamng.cursed" threads, the "funny" rating could be re-added, but on threads where serious discussion is expected, e.g. official vehicle threads, and the "update speculation thread", it can be removed. there might be technical limitations though, i'm not sure.