There, I did it myself. Instead of asking "Why are some questions written in this funny way?", I produced what strikes me as bad English ever so often: Questions that are formed by starting out with "Why" (or other interrogative words), followed by what seems to be a normal subject-verb-object sentence. A few examples are quickly drawn from some other SE sites (missing question marks included), but this seems to be quite common all across the board:
- “Why we need SELinux?”
- “Why ATM and MPLS are at level 2.5”
- “Why Turn Collate Off”
- “Why BitTorrent uploads simultaneously?”
- “Why the letters in keyboards are arranged like this?”
I do have the impression that the actual article beneath such a question is often written in quite good English, so the writer is not necessarily a beginner of the language.
Therefore my question, mainly aimed at the native speakers of English: Is this considered to be good style? Or do you find it sloppy? What's your impression when you read such a construct?