[mattylad]

As an outsider here & not having taken part or seen the thread concerned, I'd say if a mod or admin of a forum deleted it because it had potential to cause problems for the forum or their owners then I'm afraid that it would just have to be lived with & I would.

Although the forums (whichever they may be, wherever on the web) are "for" the users they are run by the administration team & their decisions have to be accepted otherwise there is no point in having any moderation.

Decisions can often differ between different moderators, especially if they do not have a set of specific guidelines to follow.

Expecting a mod to spent the time to chop & change threads, delete messages from them when the whole thread can be deleted because it contains potential troublesome posts can be asking a lot from a mod.

If this site does not already have a separate admin/mod only area to move troublesome posts into then it would be highly advised to do so, having been an admin of another site I found this most useful, especially for allowing the mods to temporarily move the thread there while a final decision was sought or changes made.
Auto pruning if available can clear out the forum after a set period.

As users, does it really matter if a thread is removed? do you really lose anything?