Just a thought.
Add a TEXT field to the Users database "IgnoreList". On a post is a "Ignore This User" icon. Pushing the button appends the U_Number onto the user's IgnoreList field (i.e. $IgnoreList .= ",$PostID";).
When doing show*.php grab the value of that user's Ignore field and make it into an array. Then, when viewing threads do an array_search( $UserIDOfThread, $IgnoreListArray ); and if there is a match then we put either put in a placehold which lets the user reread the thread with IgnoresOff or just not print the thread.
Seems simple enough to code, can anyone see anything I might have missed before I give it a try?