The company behind popular tabletop game Cards Against Humanity is accused of promoting a hostile work culture environment for it's employees. The card game is famously known for including material that is dark in nature, which is what made it a success in the first place.
In the game, players are dealt 10 white cards each, and a judge draws a black card. The judge reads out the black card, usually requiring a fill in the blank response, and players submit a white card as an answer. The answers range from referencing pop culture to making lewd jokes. The person with the funniest response wins the round. It's a very offensive game by design, and the over the top nature of the cards has made it both extremely popular and controversial. The game has been constantly updated over the years, with new cards arriving and certain ones being cycled out.
Polygon has released a special report detailing employees experiences at the company. Multiple interviews speak of how the work environment is consistently hostile towards minorities like people of color, gay people, and women, with a focus in hostility towards black women and non-binaries. According to the report, the lack of a human resources department at the workplace has become a running joke at the office, which contributed to a culture of fear for those minorities. One incident that the report details is a time when the writers were suggesting including a card with the literal phrase "n-word." A former writer for Cards Against Humanity, Nico Carter, told Polygon that concerns from Black writers about cards such as that one were often ignored. An employee who chose to remain anonymous out of fear of being caught speaking out due to their non disclosure agreement gave their account on the behavior of Cards Against Humanity co-founder Max Temkin:
"It felt like there’s some sort of weird power trip. There’s also just some sort of complete unawareness that he’s talking to a Black man about the N-word. And he’s the boss of this card company. This is one of those moments where everyone’s in shock, and I look back at it and I’m like, ‘Why didn’t I leave? Why didn’t I just leave right then?’"
The card was ultimately rejected. In addition, the report goes into detail of sexual assault accusations that Max Temkin has faced. A Cards Against Humanity spokesperson has stated that as of June 9th, 2020, Temkin has stepped down. Changes are said to be coming to the workplace's infrastructure, with the company hiring “an independent third-party HR consultant" to help the lack of a HR department.
The future is now unknown for the workplace of the admittedly crude game. The actions taken so far are a start, but it's clear that hard work is necessary to undo the long history of the culture that people like Temkin built into the company. The damage that's been done is going to be difficult to undo, but hopefully, with time and effort, the Cards Against Humanity workplace environment can grow into something better than it was.