Why not? … I think there is nothing wrong if users “collect some badges” just because they want to have them 
… I’m sure it improves the quality of the content.
Eg:
I was happy as I got my first “Popular Link” badge in the Docker forum; >50 clicks on a link from someone else … not me I have 31 of them. I was actively posting there from mid 2016 to 2018.
I have 18 “Hot Links” with more than 300 clicks. … Together with 1400 others that have that badge. The group has about 15000 users. So it’s top 10%
I have 12 “Famous Links” > 1000 clicks with only 508 others … 1 Link has 10200 clicks in a topic that has ~24000 views … top 4%
So in conclusion more than 30% of my popular links are really “hot” … I like that and I like to know that