First, they came for the Bushwick bars—now, the Lower East Side drinking holes seem doomed to fall at the hands of "anti-booze" activists, with area nightlife proprietors claiming they're being targeted by teetotaling neighborhood groups. Why anyone would complain about drunk people on the LES is beyond us, but it's all fun and games until someone vomits up an intestine on Ludlow.

Earlier this month, LES nightlife impresario Rob Shamlian announced he was unloading local boozeries The Derby, Spitzer’s Corner, Los Feliz, and Fat Baby, arguing that local activist group LES Dwellers was hard at work trying to shut him down. "It’s a quality of life issue and I’ve had enough of the hostile neighborhood groups, the blogs with no culpability who are able to spout whatever nonsense they think of, and the constant harassment," he told Bowery Boogie last week.

It's true that the LES Dwellers are trying to get the Community Board and SLA to crack down on the allegedly rowdy bars—the group's mission statement bemoans the surge in the neighborhood's bar scene, noting, "It is not a fait accompli that we are required to live in an 'entertainment zone' with unsustainable and detrimental environmental conditions and degraded quality of life."

Last month, the group released a video documenting some pretty aggressive early-morning activity in the neighborhood's so-called "Hell Square." "This weekend was an outrage—ranking as one of the worst on record: It was SantaCon without the costumes," the group noted after the video's release. "Assaults and crime are up in our neighborhood due solely to the proliferation of late night liquor licenses in the neighborhood."

According to the Post, the situation downtown is something of a standoff, with bar owners claiming the group—and other area residents—won't back off. "These people have no mercy," one local bar owner told the tabloid, noting that residents constantly report him to 311. Well, at least they were spared of SantaCon.