THQ Nordic 8chan PS4 PlayStation 4 1

It’s been almost a week since THQ Nordic bafflingly hosted an AMA on ethically questionable website 8chan, prompting an unprecedented backlash due to the forum's connections with racism, hate speech, and, unthinkably, child pornography. The organisation apologised at the time, claiming that it was unaware of the community’s poor reputation, but within the Q&A itself, employees from the publisher responded to memes including homophobic slurs and much more. It looked bad.

The firm has now, almost a week later, taken the opportunity to issue an apology. Before we republish it, in its entirety, we would just like to explain a little more about the company’s corporate structure. THQ Nordic AB is the parent company of THQ Nordic GmbH Vienna, and it’s the latter subsidiary that was responsible for the AMA. THQ Nordic AB’s co-founder and group CEO Lars Wingefors has attached his name to the following statement, after he said last week that the matter had already been addressed:

This letter is to offer my sincerest apologies and regret for THQ Nordic GmbH Vienna's interaction with the controversial website 8chan last Tuesday, 26th February. I condemn all unethical content this website stands for. Even if no one within the THQ Nordic Group would ever endorse such content, I realize simply appearing there gave an implicit impression that we did.

As co-founder and group CEO of THQ Nordic AB, I take full responsibility for all of THQ Nordic GmbH's actions and communications. I have spent the past several days conducting an internal investigation into this matter. I assure you that every member of the organization has learned from this past week's events. I take this matter very seriously and we will take appropriate action to make sure we have the right policies and systems in place to avoid similar mistakes in the future.

As a Swedish-based, fast growing group, we firmly support equality and diversity. We are also working actively to combat discrimination, harassment, and misconduct. We are already in the process of developing new work processes, based on the United Nations' SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) and using the GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) standards, and we will accelerate this work going forward.

There’s no word on how the responsible parties will be punished, although legally that’s probably a matter that must remain behind closed doors. The question is: are you ready to forgive and forget – or do you feel that THQ Nordic must do more to regain your trust? Let us know your thoughts on this whole sorry saga in the comments section below.

[source gamesindustry.biz]