MS Society ‘Apologizes’ for Dismissal of 90-Year-Old Volunteer Over Pronoun Questions After Intense Backlash
“The National Multiple Sclerosis Society apologizes to our longtime, dedicated volunteer Fran Itkoff … We realize now that we made a mistake, and we should have had more conversations with Fran before making this decision.”
Over the weekend, we wrote about 90-year-old Fran Itkoff, who is a lifelong volunteer for the National MS Society, in honor of her late husband, who passed away 20 years ago and who battled MS for decades.
In an interview done with Libs of TikTok founder Chaya Raichik, Mrs. Itkoff said she was unceremoniously dismissed from her role last month after she asked questions about the organization’s use of pronouns in the context of their DEI policies after seeing it in some of the MS Society’s literature.
To quickly recap, in a late Friday afternoon email sent to Itkoff in mid-January, the group’s Community Engagement Manager, Kali Kumor, notified her that due to an alleged “failure to abide by our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion guidelines,” they had “made the difficult decision” to tell her to “step down from your volunteer position, effective immediately.”
They also told her that she and the Lakewood/Long Beach self-help group she leads were “still welcome to attend and participate in the Society’s events and programs.” However, the MS Society would no longer be “formally affiliated” with them:
UNREAL. National MS Society (@mssociety) forced a 90-year-old volunteer to step down because she wasn’t “inclusive” enough after she asked what pronouns are.
Fran volunteered for 60 years and her late husband had MS.
The @mssociety still hasn’t said a word about this. Don’t… pic.twitter.com/OlXrT2kClQ
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 14, 2024
In an update to this story, thanks to the ensuing outcry, which included vows to donate money elsewhere and inquiries from public figures like Fox News senior meteorologist Janice Dean, who suffers from MS, the National Multiple Sclerosis Society has issued an “apology” of sorts to Mrs. Itkoff, though they said their original decision was made “with the best intentions”:
The National Multiple Sclerosis Society apologizes to our longtime, dedicated volunteer Fran Itkoff. Recently, we asked Fran to step down from her role as a group leader because of statements made that we viewed as not aligning with our recently implemented diversity, equity and inclusion policy. We realize now that we made a mistake, and we should have had more conversations with Fran before making this decision.
Over her 60 years of volunteer service, Fran has been a committed champion for our cause. We had an opportunity to work with her and support her as a self-help group volunteer leader, but as an organization, we fell short.
While we acted at the time with the best intentions, we did not have clear protocols in place. We should have spent more time with Fran to help her understand why, as an organization, we are dedicated to building a diverse and inclusive movement where everyone has equitable access to the care, connections, and support they need to live their best lives.
We apologized to Fran directly and reached out to her to find a way to continue to work together. In the spirit of continuous learning, we are focused on evaluating our processes and fortifying our learning to ensure our team members are equipped on the best ways to implement all of our policies. We want everyone to feel confident and supported in their roles. This work is a journey requiring commitment, accountability, transparency, and courage.
The National MS Society is a nonpartisan organization committed to one bold vision – a world free of MS. The support of our volunteers is essential to achieving our mission and ensuring people affected by MS can live their best lives. MS does not discriminate, and everyone who shares our vision of a world free of MS is welcome here.
For many critics of the MS Society, however, including Dean, their apology fell way short considering it appeared like they were not apologizing for dismissing her, but apologizing instead for not giving her a more in-depth explanation for why they did it:
PS, Fran, thank you for helping all of us by trying to raise money and awareness for a cure someday. I’m grateful.
— Janice Dean (@JaniceDean) February 21, 2024
I love the work @MS_Focus does if you’re looking for another place to support. https://t.co/szSeUR5tII
— Janice Dean (@JaniceDean) February 22, 2024
This is not enough. Shame on you for letting politically correctness come before a decades long dedicated volunteer. https://t.co/T62XKV5gQY
— Kathleen McKinley (@KatMcKinley) February 22, 2024
Not enough, not NEARLY enough! Until you get rid of the DEI crap in your organization, we will STILL not support you. You want the dollars back you are losing, lose the DEI. https://t.co/Zd8yo9mEWW
— Hammy ✈🇺🇲🇮🇱 (@e2pilot) February 21, 2024
After all this time for reflection, and after all this backlash, @mssociety's big revelation was that they should have *spent more time helping a 90 year old woman understand the pronoun nonsense before giving her the boot*.
You can't make this kind of stupid up. https://t.co/fW9FYYHvXj pic.twitter.com/DpDDKx7yTJ
— pragmatometer (@pragmatometer) February 21, 2024
Imagine getting an apology letter like this that ultimately blames you, a 90 yr old volunteer, for being too dim to understand how declaring your pronouns helps people with MS. "So sorry we didn't re-educate you about how bigoted your question about pronouns was- our bad!" https://t.co/7xfnZbgFCE pic.twitter.com/i8B8gvH3kb
— Sarah Smith (@Hale_Storm) February 21, 2024
Too little, too late.
Fran doesn't need to be "educated" about anything. She's a 90 year old lady who knows what a woman is. Will you force her and your other volunteers to bow to the Pronoun Cult to continue working for you or not?
Answer the question. https://t.co/yaEBiJmSVr— Camilla Rhodes 🌺🇺🇲 (@_thisisthegirl_) February 21, 2024
Raichik is also not letting them off the hook:
A few remaining questions:
1. Who’s getting fired over this?
2. How are you awarding Fran for the heartache and damage you caused her?
3. Which specific policies will be changed and to what?
4. Did you remove your woke pronoun policy? https://t.co/arTk9bk2Lf— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 22, 2024
We’ll keep you posted if there are any further updates on this story, including if the MS Society decides to answer those and other questions. As always, stay tuned.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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Comments
Apology not accepted, those behind this should be ousted.
Performative Apology — n, the least apology-like thing there is.
The apology went out because the MS execs realized it was going to hurt fund raising. A drop in fund raising cuts into their lucrative compensation.
IMO, when a charitable/volunteer organization puts a higher priority on obeying the pronoun police than delivering on its core mission then the time has come to abandon that organization. Same for other polices outside its core mission.
Their core mission is to bow to the Alphabet Mafia, not to cure the world of MS. That’s just a side bar.
Here’s their true mission according to their most recent 1099.
118 employees receive more than $100,000 per year.
Total $3,496,384. That amount is BEFORE a single dime is spent on their core mission.
The CEO, $473,000 plus $33,000 additional compensation.
Chief Advocacy Officer, $317,000 plus $76,000 additional compensation.
Chief People & Volunteer Officer, $331,000 plus $34,000 additional compensation.
Stop feeding the woke.
Thank you for doing some digging and reporting such eye-opening pocket-lining taking place in the upper echelons of this apparently utterly corrupt “charity” organization. They will never see another penny from me.
Dear God, that’s more than Fauci’s salary!
Fire all 3.
I commented on the prior post that most of the national charities spent very little on actual core mission, whether it is funding medical research or funding services to the poor. Most of the funding goes to administrative support and executive salaries.
If you are charitably inclined, donate to a local charity such as a church, or local private school often affiliated with a religous organization or local homeless shelter. Dont donate to a national organization.
$3,496,384 BEFORE a single dime is spent? How about WHILE all the dimes are spent. They have a Four Star rating with Charity Navigator with a score of 98%, including 5/5 for Program Expense Ratio at 72.17% and 5/5 for Fundraising Efficiency at $0.19 per dollar. That $3,496,384 is out of a total budget of over $159 million. Stop hiding the ball. They’re woke and tone-deaf, but they’re not off-mission or self-serving.
It should apply to everything, not just charitable/volunteer orgs. Like how about our school systems? Our government? Our beer companies! Especially our beer companies!
Sure. If your local school district and local gov’t have gone all in on woke weirdo policies then pack your crap and move. Deny them your tax dollars. Same for any consumer product, find a non woke alternative and Yuengling Beer is a great one.
The left always puts politics before the stated cause of every organization they capture. This is how Asian-American Organizations backed the California referendum limiting Asians in college.
so wait
if americans fight back they will win
hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
another “pronoun” issue in the news …but wont be for long is
a trans student had its head bashed in school by 3 “teen” females in OK
the police are stating that the it did notttt die b/c of the head being bashed in
so that would mean that the perps are HIGHER ON THE PROTECTED ANIMAL list
who could that be???
Have you given some thought to finishing third grade? Your parents would be so proud of you.
What do you know about parent’s pride?
Your comments here have no substance and it’s an embarrassment.
Thad Jarvis knows that Pale scum parents are proud when their psychic brats become martyrs.
Have you given some thought to drowning yourself? We would be so proud of you.
The “apology” is worse than the original sin.
Bud Light School of Winning Friends and Influencing People.
As my dad taught us, “it is never the crime and always the coverup which leads to their undoing.”
I guess “inclusivity” doesn’t include those who don’t accept woke pronouns. Yeah, let’s be more inclusive by excluding people, that’s the ticket!
To be fair, their intersectionality is driven by a complete lack of logic skills. Now imagining how the storyboard for Dumb and Dumber could be applied to the SOP of these charity organizations.
The irony here is that AA, literally a bunch of drunks, came up with a pretty foolproof set of guidelines in the 12 traditions which has allowed them to avoid situations like this for over 80 years. And some apply those 12 traditions to their personal lives to avoid the conflicts and SNAFU’s. I am self-supporting though my own voluntary contributions, and my allegiance is therefore to me and me alone. THAT is freedom.
Notice how skillfully they placed the blame for firing this fine lady on the “organization”. Which is utter bullshit, because some individual or individuals were responsible for denouncing and punishing her, and considering the backlash they should be outed and shamed.
But part of being woke is denying individual responsibility for any negative in-group actions up to and including major felonies and mortal sins.
wouldnt these charities lose their tax exempt status if they were guilty of hiring white supremacists?
so then they not only hired ageists but they have a policy that discriminates
so that should have them lose that (immoral) tax free status
Wow what a brilliant analysis.
What an ignorant comment.
Perhaps they should have had more “conversations” with a lot of people before embarking on the path of DEI reverse racism and aligning with the trans Mafia led by the pronoun police.
Not at all. The National MS Society appears to be a leftists trash heap dedicated to forcing the most perverse, deranged sort of insanity on society.
The National MS Society is comprised of despicable, depraved leftist lunatics who are too dumb to even know the difference between men and women. An organization that demented and stupid could not possibly help to solve any real problem, certainly not more than the real problems it causes in its demented leftism. It’s a sick, sick group of people who seem to be fond of using the emotional blackmail of chronically ill people to promote its lunatic views of society.
May they lose millions in donations, and put the purple hair, nose-ring, trannies out of work.
There are plenty of organizations dedicated to the cure and treatment of MS.
Mostly all of these charities are groups that were overtaken by grifters. Their ultimate goal is have TV commercials with Sarah McLachlan singing in the background. For the feels.
Is that what Sarah McLachlan does… sing!?
I thought that noise was Banshees calling me to cross to the other side.
Bud Light moment.
Invisible hand… keep slapping.
Trump is now a big supporter of Bud Light:
https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2024/02/07/trump-bud-light-anheuser-busch-fundraiser
And we care, why?
Trump is entitled to support whomever he chooses, as you are.
But you are so wedded to having your nose up Biden’s ass that you can’t realize that we won’t vote for Biden.
Trump (or his advisors) failed to realize that while thousands may have lost their jobs at AHB, it is likely that thousands were hired by competing firms that took up the slack. The same amount of beer is being drunk, it is just from different colored cans. AHB effed over their employees. Because they no longer teach “the free market” these days( apparently even at business schools?), the wokesters are always blindsided by its sudden appearance, like the laws of gravity and inertia when they step out in front of a car in the crosswalk. In a perfect world, AHB will likely kill the UFC as well. They are toxic at the gangrene level thse days. Cut off the affected limb and move on, or else.
From 2022 filings:
The President and CEO of the National MS Society leeches half a million a year. Two other top officers make about $400,000/year.
Salaries, wages, and fundraising make up over 40% of National MS Society expenses. And that is with tons of their real work being done by volunteers.
Yea, makes sense, CEO gets all the money and the slave labor volunteer gets zip. Something is wrong with this picture.
Something is wrong, but it is working perfectly as they intended.
They’re only sorry for the backlash, not for their actions nor their policy.
Apology not accepted, because apology is motivated by wrong thing [we got caught] rather than the right thing [we were flat out wrong, and are earnestly sorry, and the person in charge has been fired].
Wokepology.
“While we acted at the time with the best intentions”
Nah, you acted out of malice.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
I question whether there are many 90 year olds who could learn this pronoun BS? The 81 year old in the White House does not look as if he could.
He wouldn’t know it if he did. He can’t remember what he had for breakfast, nor anything else if it weren’t written on a note card. It’s so bad he even reads descriptors.
“We apologized to Fran directly and reached out to her to find a way to continue to work together.”
And, being a sweet old lady, just chock full of tea and lavender, she didn’t tell them to shove it up their ass like she should have.
The day is young.
That is a “Sorry you feel that way” apology I have ever seen.
Fire or demote the individual(s) responsible for this inexcusable behavior. THEN submit your apology.
“While we acted at the time with the best intentions …”
See! I told you they thought they were doing god’s work.
Eris was a god.
They still don’t get it. The MS Society said “we should have had a conversation with Fran”.
No, the MS Society’s conduct was plain wrong. There was no reason to have a conversation. Stop the biased conduct MS society!!
And save you money, donate to the Salvation Army or VOA.
“MS does not discriminate”
Except when it does.
“Good intentions.” The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. So is the road to bankruptcy.
Thank you, Mrs. Itkof, for your service in supporting MS patients and their families.