Police say the men had dispersed by the time officers responded.
The video was posted on YouTube.
A whole lot of naughty and not much nice.
That's a pretty good description of the apparent SantaCon brawl captured on a cellphone.
Several men can be seen beating the heck out of each other as passersby intervene to break it up.
"It is disconcerting because it involves a lot of alcohol and that I think is part of the major problem behind Santacon," State Senator Brad Hoylman said.
State Senator Brad Hoylman was one of those leading the charge to make this year's massive Santa-themed pub crawl kinder and gentler.
In fact, both the Long Island Rail Road and New Jersey Transit even banned alcohol on the train that day, but that may not have sobered things up much.
"More steps need to be taken," said Phyllis Mangles, a Gramercy resident.
Phyllis Mangles lives at the corner of 16th and 3rd, the scene of that SantaCon fist fight.
She's says some drunken Santas and their elves used nearby Stuyvesant Square as a combination trash can and toilet.
"It's the public nuisances of the vomiting and the urinating that really puts people off," Mangles said.
And it's perhaps the public brawling that's now the subject of a police investigation.
Senator Hoylman also wants to get the State Liquor Authority involved.
"We're going to reassess this year's event and then determine whether the SLA needs to take action to curb irresponsible binge drinking at next year's SantaCon," State Senator Hoylman said.
