Social Media Rumor Sparks Undue Outrage Against Ice Cream Shop

RIVERHEAD, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) -- An ice cream shop in Riverhead has been caught in the middle of a social media rumor.

As CBS2's Jennifer McLogan reported, someone posted a fourth-hand account on Facebook alleging that a neighbor of a relative's friend said his son wasn't served at Snowflake Ice Cream Shoppe because he voted for President Trump.

"[I was] blown out of my mind that someone would write something like that about us," said owner Stu Feldschuh.

"We come from all different backgrounds and all different beliefs," said Snowflake employee, Elena Cahn. "Why would we impose that on anyone?"

Even though Feldschuh knew the account wasn't true, he didn't think much of it at first.

"My first reaction was to just ignore it," said Feldschuh. "It will go away, but it grew and it grew very quickly."

Stung by the false posting, customers and employees got involved.

"[It's] absolutely absurd that they wouldn't serve someone here," said on customer.

"Wonderful. They're great, kind," said another.

"Been coming here for years," commented another customer.

Dozens of posts of support later, whoever made up the remarks removed them.

And Snowflake, a mom and pop business here since the 1950's, posted a big thank you.

Facebook's internal community standards policy pledges that monitors will remove any inaccurate, inappropriate or terroristic posts.

Feldschuh thought it was wrong when a baker in Colorado refused to make a cake for a gay couple.

He says he was equally upset that a Virginia restaurant refused to serve press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders; adding he sympathizes with the other Red Hen restaurants that mistakenly felt the repercussions.

And now?

"The young people at Snowflake are handling the social media for us," said Feldschuh.

It showed them just how destructive social media can sometimes be. Snowflake says they want this upcoming July 4 holiday to focus instead on red, white, and blueberries.