A discussion about thread closures

[blindswelledrat]

I know this gets a little tedious for you lot, but here is something that peaked my curiosity:

kinky when locking a thread said:

Right - that's it.

Sorry Ian. I really wanted this thread to run - but not at the expense of continued personal sniping for whatever reason, and possible binnings.

It's not personal, and I'm not taking sides. It's just quite frankly not on.

You see this kind of thread closure all the time and think nothing of it.
I have no critisism of threads being closed like this
but today whilst enjoying the East Anglia antics I suddenly wondered:

WHy do you close threads in which people are getting annoyed with one another?
They are hugely entertaining for others (entertainment being the ultimate purpose of a forum surely?)
If they overstep the mark then they get sinbinned and so on- but no harm is actually done.
THey may even argue themselves into agreement.