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In March 2016, Cesia (owner of Abi's Cafe in Minneapolis) hired a homeless man asking for money. Soon after, she shared a photo on Facebook of him washing dishes. The post went viral, and the story became a sensation. Celebrities called, donations poured in, and everyone thought this was a story with a happy ending.
It wasn't.
The man started to drink heavily. He got kicked out of three homes. He couldn't do his job.
Cesia didn't want to continue babysitting this grown man, and the media frenzy continued. Eventually, she had to cut ties with him and stop taking media calls.
This is the rest of this story that millions of people saw, but no one really knew. It's as much about the nature of media on the internet as it is about the difficultly helping someone in active addiction.
Yet despite the not-so-happy ending, Cesia continues to help those who ask. As demonstrated in this video, it takes more than one bad experience to tarnish a heart of gold.
Hope you like my latest video:
Cesia's story reveals many important truths about addiction and helping those who suffer from it--all of which will be featured in my upcoming documentary series on homelessness in America.
It really is strange how our society will focus on a feel good story and it goes viral, while turning such a blind eye to the underlying issues. I was the general manager of a grocery store in downtown Eugene, Oregon for a number of years and I got a lot of practice interacting with homeless people (the grocery store was across the street from the downtown bus station). It was amazing how much they appreciated me treating them as human. Just walking up and smiling and sticking my hand out to shake and introducing myself and chatting for a minute before launching into whatever interaction I had to do, asking them to quit spare changing in front of our door, sleeping in the cardboard recycling, drinking in the parking lot, peeing behind someone's car - whatever it was - I had so many people literally thank me even though I was basically kicking them off the property. But they were thanking me for just treating them like a human. Really made me realize how so many people in society dehumanize the homeless for them to react as if me treating them like a person was a rare and noteworthy occurrence. And of course it made my life easier as well, I never once had one of these conversations turn confrontational.
"...they were thanking me for just treating them like a human." Bingo. A common problem is that people think giving some change or whatever is "treating them like a human". As you say, I've found to be true: people who are homeless want to seen, and interacted with, as equal. And like you later said, it made working with them easier when needing them to clear out. The problem is that this requires connecting with others, and that is what is tricky for many people.
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Hi there!
That is quite a story indeed. Yet a genuine act of kindness is not always ends well. But atleats we do give it a try. We did hope that all is well. We cannot control or manipulate people to change. We can only encourage them the goodness in it.
Sometimes social media makes things worst! If you gonna do some good deed just do it. You dont have to tell the whole world about it. Its much better to be good especially when no one is watching.
Atleast her heart to help othera never cease despite the bad experience. Anyway, not all people are like him. We still ahve hope that there are still good people wortg helping out.
Thanks for sharing the information.
Cheers! ❤
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"We cannot control or manipulate people to change. We can only encourage them the goodness in it."
Well said! :)
I'm glad you liked my post. Thanks for commenting!
Hi there!
That is quite a story indeed. Yet a genuine act of kindness is not always ends well. But atleats we do give it a try. We did hope that all is well. We cannot control or manipulate people to change. We can only encourage them the goodness in it.
Sometimes social media makes things worst! If you gonna do some good deed just do it. You dont have to tell the whole world about it. Its much better to be good especially when no one is watching.
Atleast her heart to help othera never cease despite the bad experience. Anyway, not all people are like him. We still ahve hope that there are still good people wortg helping out.
Thanks for sharing the information.
Cheers! ❤
Posted using Partiko Android
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Click here to view your Board of Honor
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STOPTo support your work, I also upvoted your post!
@fedoraonmyhead, i always belive give people a second chance. And then it up to that person whether he appreciated it or not. Sometimes homeless people due to no one gave them a second chance, and end up repeat their bad habit. I respect what cesia did, it just that society always like to make it big and viral the story. I glad that after what happen to the homeless man, it didn't stop her from doing good. Our society need more people like cesia. Salute to her. Thank you for sharing this story @fedoraonmyhead.
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What a sad story. It's hard to help anyone with addiction and mental health issues. The one I am involved with is ptsd since my son @bxlphabet has it. I'm in a lot of support groups online for both sufferers and for family members. Everyone has pretty much the same story.
The people suffering cannot break free of the illness and succeed. Even if they do, something happens and it all comes back. There's only so much strength people have to continue.
The families cannot believe their family member cannot get over this problem and move on. They try and try and try to help and nothing really works. There's only so much strength people have to continue.
And therefore, many of the sufferers become homeless and things get worse for them. And sometimes the families drain all their resources and become homeless too.
This woman chose to save herself and this is probably the best thing she could have done given the circumstances.
I haven't heard about this story before. It's funny to see how much attention such a deed can get. But on the other hand I wonder what would happen if we would shift our attention from what she did to how we could help someone else. She indeed did something good but there are many people out there helping. We should take her as an inspiration and start helping as well. It might have not worked out for her and Markus but I think that he probably needed some professional help instead. Or maybe he just didn't handle the popularity very well. I just feel sorry for her that he was spreading some lies. BUT it's good to see her smiling and helping other people too :) I'm glad for her that she learned from this experience and is doing things differently now.
Glad that you've shared this video around Christmas. I hope that many people will be inspired by her generosity and start helping those who don't have as much as we do.
Thank you for sharing! Have a nice day!
This story reflects an old fact: that no one can be helped if doesn't want to be helped. No matter how much love and resources we use in helping others, the recipient of that love and help must want to care for him or herself too. If not, then we have a story like this. Very, very good post.
It's sad that it didn't work out as she has hoped but I am glad that that encounter didn't kill her drive to help people.
I guess no one looked deep to find out what really happened that Marcus was no longer with her. I never have had to deal with someone struggling with addiction but it clearly isn't an easy one, I know it's not easy for the addicts too even if they wanna give it up. Well, she gave him a chance. I do hope he is doing better with his family now, hopefully, being together with family will help him heal.
I love Cesia's heart.❤
Thanks for making this documentary and sharing it with is.