I'm surprised how an unimportant, virtual entity like merit is dividing adult people so much.
All is well. Some are just bored out or suffer from a nasty, over-controlling ego.
Swaystar should chill the fuck down, problem solved.
I wish there was a reference button for what post you used to put someone on ignore as I'd like to go back and see what post I decided to ignore him.
Likely impossible to implement afterwards, but if posts would be non-deletable by authors, it would be possible for future ignores through some minor changes to the forum software. There will be a need for one or two additional columns in the database table, plus edits in most of the hooks/triggers and procedures which are altering this table.
As an alternative, the forum software could open a dialog to enter some text when ignoring a user, for memorizing reason(s).
You could simply place a link to the regarding post or just the thread- and post-ID, along with some explaining words.
If the original post got deleted, you have a chance to remind yourself why you put a user on ignore. Would be a simple interface and a joined database table, only adding and removing users from the ignore list, as well as deleting a user should affect this one.