Starting on June 6, several of our former employees posted reports on social media about a toxic work environment in our Chicago office. Many of them centered on one of our eight co-founders, Max Temkin, who led that office. We immediately began an internal investigation, and on June 9, we made the following commitments to our staff:

As Cards Against Humanity rapidly grew from a hobby project in our parents’ basements to a company with 18 full-time employees, we made a lot of mistakes. We want to apologize to employees who were unheard or disrespected in our office. We are truly sorry. We also want to state unequivocally that we condemn harassment of anyone who has posted stories about their experiences at Cards Against Humanity.

In the interest of transparency, we are now sharing our complete responses to a series of questions we received via email from a reporter at Polygon regarding our company and the accounts on social media. Some of these accounts are true, others are not, and a few we are continuing to investigate.

We are committed to rebuilding a workplace that the partners and staff can be proud of. It is our responsibility to see this through.

Sincerely,
Josh, Daniel, Eli, Ben, David M., David P.
Active Co-Founders, Cards Against Humanity

*Update June 29 1:49 PM CT: In recent days, a viral social media post claimed that Cards Against Humanity had an employee involuntarily committed to a mental institution. Here is our statement from June 23 where we refuted this claim in detail.

Polygon: "How many employees and contractors work for Cards Against Humanity and its affiliated companies?"

The current Cards Against Humanity LLC staff includes:

The Chicago Board Game Cafe staff includes:

Polygon: "With how many former employees has Cards Against Humanities settled in mediation at the IDHR?"

There has been one complaint in the company’s history. It was settled and then withdrawn.

Polygon: "Does Cards Against Humanity have a human resources department? When was that department established?"

Cards Against Humanity retains a dedicated HR contractor who began working in January 2019. In 2018, HR was handled by our COO. Prior to that, the responsibilities of HR were divided between our COO and another staff member whose job responsibilities included HR duties. We grew from four people in a one-room co-working space to a large office with about two dozen staff over a short period, and our HR systems did not keep up with our rapid growth. We are sorry for not setting up dedicated HR sooner.

Polygon: "How does the company go about responding to claims of discrimination related to sex, gender, race, or otherwise marginalized status? In particular, could you provide us with any documentation about how these types of complaints are ordinarily handled?"

Any claim of discrimination would first be referred to our HR manager, who would confidentially interview the complainant. HR would follow up as necessary with other staff identified in the complaint without identifying the complainant. The complaint would then be escalated to the partners. If necessary, any disciplinary action would be developed in collaboration with the company’s HR and legal teams.

In addition, we are bringing in an independent third-party HR consultant to audit and improve these practices. Staff will have the opportunity to confidentially share any concerns with this outside firm.

Polygon: "What is the rate of attrition at Cards Against Humanity? Does Max Temkin consider the rate of attrition at Cards Against Humanity to be unusual? Has he or anyone else high up in the company attempted to address this rate of attrition, in particular with regard to staffers of marginalized status? Does Temkin believe that there is a pattern in terms of which employees succeed and “fit in” at Cards Against Humanity, and which employees do not? If he does believe there is a pattern, how has he or any other higher-up attempted to address it?"

The national average rate of employment separations at a company for any reason in 2019 was 45.0%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In our industry (Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation) the average rate of attrition in 2019 was 78.6%. Our average rate of attrition since 2016 is approximately 18%. Here is a summary:

We don’t know if there are any demographic disparities in these statistics, but one goal of our external HR audit is to evaluate our recruitment and retention practices and make sure that all employees have a path to success at Cards Against Humanity.

Polygon: "Several employees also described negative consequences of speaking out that happened while they were still employed at the company. For example, if an employee raised concerns about workplace culture or the jokes on the cards in Cards Against Humanity, or both, they described experiencing the “silent treatment” from Temkin and/or not getting invited to decision-making meetings. Did this occur?"

A few years ago, we reduced Max’s managerial duties in response to complaints from staff, but it is now clear that we did not fully appreciate the severity of the problem. We are incredibly sorry, and we know our apologies are not enough. Max has stepped down from the company and will no longer interact with staff.

Polygon: "Several former employees have voiced concerns about potential retaliation on the part of Max Temkin personally if they share any memories of working with him or at Cards Against Humanity that could be construed as negative or discriminatory. Has Max Temkin ever retaliated against an employee for speaking out? Does he have any idea what could have led to this concern on the part of former employees?"

Max is a well-connected person in the world of Chicago games, design, and comedy. We understand why anyone would be afraid of speaking out against a prominent figure in their industry. However, we have had no reports of Max retaliating against employees or former employees in response to complaints about him or the company.

Polygon: "In general, how did Temkin and other CAH higher-ups respond to constructive criticism from his employees, regarding the company’s product and/or the company’s culture? Did employees have avenues to raise concerns anonymously, for example?"

We rely on constructive criticism from our employees and in particular from our writers on all cards in the game. Any concerns of a sensitive nature can be brought to a team leader, HR, or the COO, and then passed on to the partners confidentially. We understand that criticism can be hard to offer to those in power, and we are looking into ways to encourage open dialogue as part of our third-party HR audit.

Polygon: "Multiple employees described being fired from the company without having received prior warnings. Please provide a comment on whether this occurred and at what frequency. Is there a disciplinary process for employees not meeting standards?"

No full-time or part-time employees have been fired without prior warning. Employees who aren’t meeting standards are given a performance-improvement notification with performance standards clearly articulated. We went through this process with two employees, one of whom reached the point of termination.

For some projects, we hire people on a contract basis for a set length of time. For other projects, there is no set end date. We know of two instances where ongoing contractors had their hours cut without prior notice due to budget or performance issues. In retrospect, it would have been more professional and courteous to give them more advance warning that their contracts would not be extended in their original form. We’re sorry for the disruption this caused in their lives, and we have changed our policies to prevent this from happening in the future.

Polygon: "Furthermore, are all of CAH’s staffers and contractors listed as at-will employees?"

Yes, all full-time and part-time employees are at-will employees, as detailed in both their offer letters and the employee handbook. This is standard practice in Illinois. All independent contractors are explicitly engaged as independent contractors/providers.

Polygon: "Several writers who spoke to us described feeling “minimized publicly” in comparison to the contributions to Cards Against Humanity that were made by the eight co-founders and original writers of the game. We would appreciate your further comment on this claim."

Cards Against Humanity has had a no-attribution policy on game content, both for the founders and for the writers room. This means that nobody is given credit by name for any of the individual cards, including the founders. Writing cards is a collaborative process, and one of the core values of the writers room and the partners is “We All Wrote This Card.” We articulated this value with the writers in 2018:

The point of this policy is to prevent a situation where people are vying to take credit for specific cards or questioning each other’s creative contributions.

We are proud of the contributions of the writers room and the public presence they have in the media and Chicago comedy community. All writers are credited by name as part of the Cards Against Humanity Late Night Writers Room, a long-running showcase for the writers that has toured around the country. The head writers have been featured in podcasts, awards, and news articles. While contributing writers get less direct media attention than head writers, they frequently cite their work at Cards Against Humanity on podcasts, news outlets, and performance venues. In our latest holiday stunt, our writers room was put on public display in a 16-hour video feed and their writing was upvoted by thousands of fans.

We made no attempt to minimize the writers’ contributions, but we will be more proactive about promoting their talent. We are considering ideas for crediting everyone who contributed to a new product — either online or on the packaging — in a similar way to TV credits. We will work with the writers room on this.

*Edit June 23 4:30 PM CT: We have also learned that Max took jokes told in the writers room and tweeted them without attribution. This is unacceptable, and we're sorry to our writers room.

Polygon: "Staffers told us that card jokes pertaining to black culture would get shot down in the writers room (e.g. “Shonda Rhimes,” “Denzel”). What are the reasons?"

We published the card “Denzel” as part of the Fifth Expansion. Here is the first google images result we found for “cards against humanity denzel”:

“Shonda Rhimes” was considered but never made it into the game. The head writers noted next to the card’s spreadsheet entry, “Editorially, we need to fill in what’s funny about Shonda Rhimes.”

We are learning to give clearer feedback to the writers on why particular cards are published or rejected, particularly those that come from perspectives other than our own. We are sorry that our process left some writers feeling excluded or unheard, and we are committed to doing better.

One of the founding goals of the writers room was to add non-white perspectives to the game. Here is a small selection of our favorite cards that reflect Black culture, history, and perspectives, many authored by Black writers.

Making Cards Against Humanity a game that speaks to everyone is a goal that we continually work toward.

Polygon: "Did Max Temkin advocate to include a card with the N-word in Cards Against Humanity, against the advice of staffers? How did this situation unfold?"

No. Cards Against Humanity has never and would never print the N-word written out. The card in question, “Saying the N-word,” was submitted to the partners for consideration by a Black remote contributor in early 2018. Here is a screenshot of the card’s submission:

We solicited feedback on the card from the full writers room, including several people of color. Our head writers told us “POC in the [writers room] feel very uncomfortable and suggest, ‘White teens saying the N-word’.” Even this alternative was deemed too likely to offend, so the partners rejected the card and all variants on August 4, 2018:

Max was particularly adamant about rejecting this card. He marked this card as a bad idea in our brainstorming document (see above). (The comment “ALREADY IN GAME” refers to “My ugly face and bad personality.”) Max discussed the situation with the former staffer now making this claim in a Slack conversation a couple weeks later, screenshotted below:

Under normal circumstances, we would consider this conversation to be a confidential employee matter and would not share it publicly. However, since this person has already tweeted publicly and incorrectly about the events in question, we feel we must present this evidence.

Polygon: "Did the Cards Against Humanity have an “HR bell” in its original office that staffers would ring when they had an HR-related concern, as part of a shared in-joke that there would be no one to respond to it?"

From 2013-2014, Cards Against Humanity’s first office was a one-room, co-working space shared with several other independent game designers, journalists, and artists. Only a few Cards Against Humanity staff worked in the office. The space was built from an old pharmacy, and according to one of those employees, there was an antique bell built into the wall. Some co-workers and CAH staff made it into an inside joke, but they didn’t use it for real HR concerns. For example, if there was a Cards-related argument about whether diarrhea was funnier than vomit, they might jokingly “ring the HR bell.”

Polygon: "Did Max Temkin tell {REDACTED} that “if [she] continued dating a person Max’s friend had a crush on, [she’d] be fired?”"

In 2013, Max intervened in an interoffice relationship between someone who was renting a desk and this person — a contractor helping Max with project management — after others in the office complained that excessive flirtation was making them uncomfortable.

While we do not know the full details of what this person was told, we believe her recent report that Max dealt with this matter poorly. We apologize to her and the officemate for how this was mishandled.

Polygon: "Did Max Temkin invite employees to his apartment for 1-1 meetings?"

For the first few years of Cards Against Humanity, Max’s apartment — as well as the apartments of other Cards Against Humanity partners — were important work spaces for the company. We received customer service mail and company documents at Max’s apartment, and we would sometimes take meetings there when coffee shops or coworking spaces were crowded. To our knowledge, 1-1 meetings were rare and completely professional. No complaints were ever raised. With our current, larger office, they are no longer a practice in our company.

Polygon: "Can you describe the circumstances of {REDACTED}’s departure from Cards Against Humanity?"

This employee informed the company of her resignation from Blackbox via email at the end of business hours on Friday, Sept. 29, 2017. She cited “personal reasons” for her departure and indicated that she would not return to work on Monday, when her new team leader was due to start.

Polygon: "How do you respond to {REDACTED}’s public claim that CAH fosters a “toxic work environment” ({REDACTED TWITTER LINK})? Did {REDACTED} raise these concerns about the workplace, or any others, while employed at CAH? (For example, did she elevate this complaint about the company’s Slack culture and becoming a “social pariah” due to her complaints, as detailed in this tweet: {REDACTED TWITTER LINK})? If {REDACTED} did indeed elevate these complaints at the time, how did the company respond? What actions were taken? If no actions were taken, what led to that decision?"

On June 20, 2017, this employee (the same employee from the previous question) raised concerns of disrespectful behavior by co-workers and non-employee keycard holders in the office (a shared co-working space) to our COO. The COO was not her boss.

She asserted on Twitter that the COO refused to respond to her concern in writing. The COO sent the following email on June 22, 2017:

The COO spoke directly to the person who had been rude to this employee on Slack, informing him that he needed to communicate more respectfully and be more mindful of how his written tone came across. The COO also spoke to another team leader in the company about helping to manage the tone of all officemates on Slack. The COO followed up in-person with this employee to let her know that he had spoken to various parties about rectifying the behavior. The COO asked this employee if she had concerns about any other specific incidents, and she did not provide any.

The following day, this employee responded to the COO. (Normally, we would consider this email confidential. However, since the original email to the COO has already been shared on Twitter, we feel comfortable sharing it here for context.)

In retrospect, this employee clearly did not feel comfortable sharing her true disappointment with our actions to resolve the concerns she brought up. We want to apologize to her for not creating a workplace where she felt comfortable bringing concerns forward. As we conduct our third-party HR review, we hope to use this as a learning experience for how we can do better in the future.

In the second incident this employee reports, she shares a redacted series of emails starting with concerns she and a coworker raised about an early idea for Day 3 of Cards Against Humanity Saves America. The idea was to call attention to the issue of reparations for slavery. The partners had their own internal skepticism about whether this could be executed well, but we were open to exploring it and getting feedback from Black people both inside and outside the company.

She (a Black woman) and another employee came forward to express their concerns about this idea and their worry that it could not be done in a sensitive, progressive way. Here is the full email exchange between her and the partners, including the parts that were redacted on Twitter:

In the end, we agreed that she and others were right that this stunt was minimizing an important issue, and that this wasn’t our story to tell. We are grateful to her and her colleague for bringing their concerns forward, and we think the stunt that replaced it was stronger as a result.

We understand that “diversity and inclusion” are not just words to print in a handbook. Reflecting on this exchange, we want to be more intentional about how we get feedback from our BIPOC employees, especially on issues that go beyond the lived experience of the partners.

Polygon: "A former writer, {REDACTED}, alleged on social media that [the] head writers [...] contacted his parents about his mental health, leading to his committal into the hospital. He also alleged that Max Temkin “tried to have him fired when [he] complained” about adding the N-word to the game. Were these instances related to his dismissal from the company?"

No.

This person originally alleged on Twitter that our head writers had him involuntarily committed. That assertion is false. There are only two ways for someone to be involuntarily committed to a mental institution in Illinois: a court order, or an emergency petition. If an emergency petition is signed, a hearing must take place within 7 business days, a mental health professional must testify, and the petitioner must "prove the case by presenting clear and convincing evidence before the judge can order involuntary admission or involuntary treatment." No Cards Against Humanity employee participated in such a process. Neither of our head writers contacted this person’s parents, but we understand that one of our former writers — a personal friend of his acting completely independently of the company — contacted his parents to express concerns about his mental health.

The circumstances surrounding this person’s dismissal are confidential and unrelated to these false allegations. At that time, he was one of three Black contributing writers.

Please see the screenshot and Slack chat previously provided as proof that Max agreed with this person regarding not adding the card “Saying the N-word” to the game.

*Edited June 29 3:21 PM CT to add additional details as we learn them.

Polygon: "{REDACTED} wrote on social media that she was fired for “asserting that [she] wasn’t an employee and asking how the ownership and use of content [she] was generating for [the company] would be attributed.” Can you speak to this claim?"

Cards Against Humanity doesn’t publish which writer or partner wrote an individual card. This person’s dismissal came at a time when our head writers brought us a request to change the writers room from a pool of independent contractors to a team of part-time employees. We accepted their request. These changes created budgetary constraints that required cuts to the room. This person was one of two writers whose contracts were ended, and she was instead offered a job as a remote contributor with reduced hours. The partners were not aware of her assertions, and they were not relevant to the decision regarding her employment status.

*Here, we received three questions from Polygon which we cannot answer and are not reprinting. They related to an alleged sexual assault by Max Temkin in 2006, years before the company started. Max has denied the allegation since it first surfaced in 2014. We do not know the truth. We believe that all claims of sexual violence must be taken seriously, and we know that it takes incredible courage for a victim to speak out.

Polygon: "Staffers have told Polygon that, due to this rape accusation, Cards Against Humanity faced several challenges when it came to implementing jokes about rape or sexual assault in its card game. Some described wanting to include jokes that took a stance against rapists in the game, but were denied, because of the perceived hypocrisy of Temkin himself having been accused of such. Is it true that these jokes were discouraged?"

In 2012, two years before the allegation, we made a company decision not to include the word “rape” in the game and removed the cards “Date rape” and “Raping and pillaging” as a result. After receiving feedback from players, we decided we didn’t want to create a situation where a victim had to experience all their friends laughing about rape during a game of Cards Against Humanity. Since then, we have tried to include cards that take aim at rapists and rape culture, but without using the word. The result is that we have rejected at least one card from the writers that used the word “rape.”

Here are a few cards we’ve published since 2012 that take aim at rapists and rape culture:

We could have done a better job communicating our policy to the writers and being more transparent about our decision-making process. This is something we will continue to work on.

Polygon: "To what extent were employees permitted to talk openly about any discomfort they may have had with this accusation, Temkin’s response to it, and the fact that Cards Against Humanity’s cards continue to include references to sexual assault and rape?"

Employees freely discussed the accusation against Max at the time and since then, without retaliation. We understand why some staff could have felt uncomfortable speaking about these topics, and we hope that Max’s absence will help address this going forward.

No employees have made complaints to us about the four cards listed above. We continue to rely on our staff, especially the writers room, for feedback on all cards as part of our annual revision of the game.

Polygon: "How did this play into the company’s ongoing challenge with “punching up” versus “punching down” in terms of the jokes in the cards? Several staffers described receiving mixed messages about who the cards were aimed towards and what topics were taboo. Was making fun of rapists considered to be “taboo” at Cards Against Humanity?"

No. Our goal is to punch up and not down. New writers are required to attend paid training sessions that emphasize this point. As stated in one of our training documents, the Cards Against Humanity voice “punches up” and we “take aim at oppressors and victimizers, never the victims.”

Writers are encouraged to submit cards on any and all topics. No topic is taboo, and our feedback is always directed at specific cards and never at general categories.

When we discover during playtesting that a card is primarily being played at the expense of marginalized groups or victims, we reject it. This is true both for new cards and cards already published, as we revise the game’s content every year based on public playtests and feedback from our writers.

Polygon: "A source has informed Polygon that Temkin is considering removing himself from certain workplace operations at Cards Against Humanity. Is this true? If so, which operations, and when will this decision be announced or go into effect?"

As of Tuesday, June 9, Max stepped down from Cards Against Humanity LLC. This decision was announced to our staff the same day.

Polygon: "Will Temkin continue to receive profits from Cards Against Humanity sales even if he chooses to depart the company?"

Due to our operating agreement, he remains a one-eighth shareholder. Max is not receiving a salary.