Since I've run forums before in the past, those "badge thingies" aren't badge thingies...

Most forums like these have these stars, or other little icons, that coincide with your posting status. Like for example, 1 star for new members, 2 stars for say 50 posts, 3 stars for 100 posts, 4 stars for 1,000 posts, 5 stars for 2,000 posts... and of course, forum staff members have different stars, like admins have 5 red stars, assistant admins or global mods have 5 green stars, regular mods have like 5 blue stars, etc.