Controversy
Cohen Naulty was just 17 years old when he became the center of a highly-publicized controversy.
On the other side of the heated argument? A nearby restaurant. It appears that an unconventional decision put Cohen and the establishment in the middle of an unusual debate that played out mostly on social media. Who would come on top?
Unexpected
Cohen was just a normal teenage kid who wanted a meal from a local restaurant. It's fair to say that no one saw this coming - least of all Cohen!
The teenager was just looking to enjoy a nice meal alongside a couple of pals. But before he knew it, many people in the online world were talking about him. How could anyone respond to that, especially a teenager? He was caught completely off guard.
Previous Experience
A resident of Lynchburg, Virginia, Cohen was no stranger to the restaurant industry. It turned out that he had around 18 months' worth of serving experience himself at a local establishment called Country Cookin.
If anyone could relate to the waiting staff, it was him. But that wasn't enough to calm down the server, who was outraged at the teenager's apparent offensive gesture.
A Peculiar Approach
During his time as a server, Cohen made a lot of his money from tips. And much of that came in the form of coins.
Obviously, that's not always ideal: after all, counting out individual coins takes longer than doing the same with bank notes. But cash is cash, right? At least, that's how the young boy saw the situation.
Not Everyone Liked It
Cohen was used to carrying all his tips around with him just as you would a wallet full of dollar bills. He didn't see anything wrong with this habit.
Yet his attitude towards coins wasn't liked by everyone. In fact, his particular approach proved to be the catalyst behind the upcoming controversy that set the online community on fire.
His Treat
Cohen went to the Beer 88 restaurant on a hot summer day with his pals, Noah and James. Together, they ate enough to rack up a bill totaling $45, but the teenager insisted that he'd cover it all.
So, he pulled out his satchel of coins that he gathered from work tips and got to counting when they were preparing to leave. Everything seemed fine at first, but someone was about to make a scene.
Paying
Overall, the young boy placed $35-worth of quarters on the table, rounding it off with a $20 note. So it wasn't all coins. And that also covered the $10 tip he planned to leave to the server.
That was obviously a lot of coins. But Cohen didn't think much of it, though, and he, Noah, and James left the restaurant right after they paid. The teenager had no idea what was about to come his way.
Going On Social Media
But that's where things took a turn for the worse. After Beer 88 staff caught sight of Cohen's unusual payment method, one of them grabbed their phone and took a photo of the money.
From there, the image ended up uploaded to the restaurant's social media page alongside a less-than-flattering message. What was going on? What did the boy do wrong?
Unflattering Reaction
The restaurant was not very courteous about Cohen's method of payment, and they took his gesture as a sign of disrespect.
Was that what the teenager was trying to do? Was he trying to punish the establishment in some weird way by paying in the strangest method he could find? Or was it just a misunderstanding?
Surprise
As soon as he got home, Cohen received a text message from one of his friends he went out with, telling him to check the social media page of the restaurant.
When he opened the page of the establishment, the young boy was left in shock. He couldn't believe they said that about him. He left a nice tip, and yet they decided to shame him like this on social media.
Ridiculed
The social post on the restaurant's page read, "We'll just caption this… How not to pay at a restaurant. Cause that's the nicest thing we can think to say about this ridiculousness."
On top of that, the caption also included hashtags such as "no home training" and "we are Beer 88, not Coinstar." Ouch! Cohen couldn't believe what he was seeing.
Viral
It was indeed quite weird for one of the restaurant staff to write such a post. It was very unusual. And that obviously helped to fuel the response that followed soon after on social media.
Yes, Beer 88's message quickly went viral, leading to a debate about Cohen's decision to pay with so many coins. Was he right or wrong? Or was he trying to do something malicious?
Backlash
When it comes to the Beer 88 social media post, people weren't so thrilled. So, how did users respond? Well, some of them defended the establishment's reaction, standing up to criticism.
Because they actually got a lot of criticism. But there were plenty of people who rallied around Cohen as he went on to share his own thoughts on social media.
Unfair
Cohen's pals were also caught off guard by Beer 88's reaction and didn't want to accept. One even labeled their "no home training" jibe as "dirty." Meanwhile, the teen's mom waded in as the story continued to gather pace, too.
Kim Naulty said of the barb, "If anybody met Cohen, they… would know it couldn't be… the truth." Apparently, he was always very nice and had no intentions of offending anyone. To him, his gesture was nothing more than paying a simple bill.
Consequences
After the backlash, things got to the stage where Beer 88 needed to delete its entire social media page off the back of the furor. Anyway, while the drama was going on across social media, Cohen tried to forget about the incident and don't let it affect him so much. After all, he didn't actually do anything wrong, and the way the restaurant staff treated him online was unfair.
In order to protect the privacy of those depicted, some names, locations, and identifying characteristics have been changed and are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblances to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.