I haven't seen this. At all.
Every realm I am in—and every realm I have been in since the forums opened—has had plenty of talk in it. New players (and characters) who actually speak up are responded to within a relatively short time. Intrigue happens in-game (or, if it happens outside the game, it's certainly not on the forum—far too public!). Communication between realms happens in-game. Establishing relations happens in-game.
I have not seen even the merest suggestion of "any day-to-day operation of realm functioning" happening on the forums. People use the forums to talk with people outside their realm about their realm. They talk to people inside their realm...in the game. Inside their realm.
What happens on the forum is stuff like people saying, "Hey, I have a free character slot and I don't know where would be good to put the character," and other people responding with information about their realms. Some of this information is helpful (actually describing the realm's atmosphere), some is not. Overall, it seems to produce pretty good results.
Frankly, I think you're having the same problem that Tom is: you come into this with a "strong repulsion toward forums," so you assume the worst about them, and when you look at them, you only see the few bad things, then assume they're the norm.
