It could've been one of those cute videos a parent revisits frequently when the mood strikes because it automatically elicits smiles. After all, what could go wrong with your little boy asking Santa Claus for a gift at the local mall?

Well, a whole lot if the St. Nick your kid encounters is apparently of the woke variety.

What happened?

In the clip, a little boy sits across a table from Santa who asks, "What do you want for Christmas?"

Image source: Twitter video screenshot via @WhiteHovse

The understandably shy youngster hesitates at first and looks down; you can barely hear what he's saying.

"You don't know?" Santa asks incredulously.

Soon the kid comes to life and begins to reveal what he wants. But Santa doesn't seem to catch what the kid says — then cocks his head to the side and utters a noticeably louder, "What?"

'No guns'

Apparently, the boy asked for a gun and Santa immediately shoots that down: "No guns."

The boy's mother quickly interjects that her son means a Nerf gun, but Santa is unmoved: "Nope, not even a Nerf gun."

The poor kid then turns and looks at his mom in disbelief:

Image source: Twitter video screenshot via @WhiteHovse

"If your dad wants to get it for you that's fine, but I can't bring it to you," Santa continues. "What else would you like? Lots of other toys: Legos, bicycles, there's cars and trucks. What do you think?"

Yeah, right buddy.

Then comes the crying

Within a few moments the boy turns away from Santa and begins crying. At that point, his mom — who's holding an infant — comes over to comfort him.

Image source: Twitter video screenshot via @WhiteHovse

"Aww," Santa tells the boy. "Don't cry."

Mom fortunately tells her son that he'll still get his Nerf gun — no thanks to the guy in the red suit.

Here's the clip:

It isn't clear exactly where or when the video was recorded, but the fact that the boy and his mother are wearing coronavirus masks means the encounter couldn't have occurred more than a few weeks ago, if not sooner. It was posted Monday to Twitter.

What did observers have to say?

As far as how folks reacted to the clip, it seemed to be a mixed bag.

"The kid isn't crying because he didn't get a toy, he's crying because Santa himself told him that he's not going to buy him something as innocuous as a Nerf gun," one commenter wrote. "Just more social indoctrination starting earlier and earlier. The mom should've let 'Santa' have it."

But more than a few observers noted that Santa's hands may have been tied. One offered, "I like to think it was more of a rule that they gave the Santa rather than him denying the kid a toy he's not even going to be giving him in the first place. Say you don't give away anything that resembles a weapon or firearm so that the Karen moms don't get triggered."

Yet others had little sympathy for Father Christmas:

• "I don't agree with cancel culture, but in this case, that Santa needs a good firing," another user said. "At the stake. With nice dry wood."
• "Rather than being a douchebag, all he had to do was tell the kid he's having trouble finding those and that he'll see what he can do," another commenter said. "He still gets to be clown and deny the kid, but the kid likely walks away without bursting into tears."
• "I would have been screaming at him and demanding to see a manager if he had sent my son into tears like that," another person declared.