Store Workers Call Cops on Customer for Conniption over Pride-Themed Garden Gnome

Employees at a supermarket in Plymouth, England, had to phone for the police when a customer went into paroxysms of rage over a rainbow-themed garden gnome, local news source Plymouth Live reported.

Reports indicated that the man was a customer who had purchased the Pride month-edition garden decoration without, evidently, understanding what it was in spite of its rainbow-colored cap and the Pride flag in its hand.

The man was described as being "loud" and "abusive" toward store workers. The Plymouth Live article quoted a witness to the situation who described a scene in which the angry customer "started saying random things like it's a gnome, it's offended him as they don't have a sexuality."

Garden gnomes are typically depicted as having gender, with male gnomes sporting beards. The article said that the witness indicated that the enraged customer's gnome was identical to a male gnome depicted in a Facebook ad posted by the supermarket. The ad specifies that the rainbow-colored gnomes are a "special" Pride edition of the popular yard accessories.

But the customer in question didn't seem to have realized that before having purchased the gnome. The company described the customer as "highly aggressive" and said that the staff had to phone the police for help in dealing with him.

"We don't accept threatening or abusive behavior towards colleagues or customers," a company spokesperson said, according to a story in UK newspaper The Independent.

Garden gnomes have been depicted in a variety of novelty editions and have been featured in animated films such as 1980's "Gnomes" and 2011's "Gnomeo and Juliet," both of which feature romances between heterosexual gnome couples. The films did not inspire any reported fits of gnome rage, however.