YULE BE SORRY!
SI Mall boycott as Xmas put out in cold
Staten Island’s largest mall has pulled the plug on a wildly popular Santa Claus event and even moved its Christmas tree outside — enraging shoppers who are now calling for a boycott.
Protesters set up a “Boycott Staten Island Mall this Christmas Season” Facebook page after the center yanked its annual Santa Parade. They picked up more than 15,000 supporters in less than a day.
The country’s “double standards in race and religion are a joke,” Gregory Diaz fumed on Facebook. “What the hell is so offensive please tell me ?’’
Another writer raged, “It is being interpreted that the MALL doesn’t want to offend non Christians. . . . This latest effort to block Christmas is nothing more than Political BS.’’
The mall had already moved its Christmas tree outside last year, and Santa has been relegated to a lowtraffic corner by J.C. Penney for seven or eight years, according to store owners and shoppers.
Mall managers backpedaled on the axed “welcome Santa’’ parade after The Post called Monday for comment, promising to reinstate it next year.
“We heard the disappointment in your shopper feedback regarding the cancellation of the annual Santa Parade,” the mall’s general manager, James Easley said in a statement.
“Accordingly, on [Dec. 4, the] Staten Island Mall will host a holiday celebration for the community, complete with Santa, a treelighting, toy drive, etc. We will host the annual Santa Parade next year.”
Easley later told The Post, “There will be no parade this year because Santa is already here.”
But the protesters scoffed that this was no Christmas miracle.
“This is a start in the right direction, BUT NOT ENOUGH!” wrote boycott organizer Joe DeMarco on Facebook. “There needs to be some commitments for the future too. Will the Tree be back in Center court next year?”
Shopper Margie Spencer, 51, who used to work at the mall, said she wasn’t impressed by the center’s aboutface, either.
“I’ll believe it when I see it,’’ she said. “There’s a little less holiday spirit here every year. They took the [Christmas] train [away], and they moved Santa and the tree to the edges” of the mall.