This came up in relation to the upcoming mod election, e.g. Dennis' question here, and tombull89's and Iain's comments here, but I think the discussion of this shouldn't be limited to "what do the the candidates think they would do to change/improve SF?"

I don't know if everyone would completely agree with Iain's comment, but I suspect most of the regulars would agree there is a problem, and this is not a bad way of summarizing it:

SF is no longer by professionals for professionals it is by professionals for amateurs and if you try to fix it then you're considered hostile and unfriendly

So the purpose of this question is to focus on whether there's anything anyone (mods, users, SE staff (?)) can do to improve the disconnect between the professional sysadmins that the site is supposed to be aimed at and other people who use the site.