No one likes these apples. Matt Damon is in hot water after sharing that his daughter taught him several months ago he could no longer use the "f-word" as a slur for gay people.
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The story came out in an interview with the Sunday Times while he was promoting his new film "Stillwater."
"The word that my daughter calls the 'f-slur for a homosexual' was commonly used when I was a kid, with a different application," Damon told the Times. "I made a joke, months ago, and got a treatise from my daughter. She left the table. I said, 'Come on, that's a joke! I say it in the movie 'Stuck on You!' She went to her room and wrote a very long, beautiful treatise on how that word is dangerous. I said, 'I retire the f-slur!' I understood."
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Now, following the backlash, Damon has expanded on his comments on social media amidst the uproar.
"During a recent interview, I recalled a discussion I had with my daughter where I attempted to contextualize for her the progress that has been made – though by no means completed – since I was growing up in Boston and, as a child, heard the word 'f*g' used on the street before I knew what it even referred to," Damon said in a statement, USA TODAY reported.
"I explained that that word was used constantly and casually and was even a line of dialogue in a movie of mine as recently as 2003; she in turn expressed incredulity that there could have ever been a time where that word was used unthinkingly. To my admiration and pride, she was extremely articulate about the extent to which that word would have been painful to someone in the LGBTQ+ community regardless of how culturally normalized it was. I not only agreed with her but thrilled at her passion, values and desire for social justice."
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Damon continued sharing that he has never personally used the word to refer to another human being.
"I have never called anyone 'f****t' in my personal life and this conversation with my daughter was not a personal awakening," he said "I do not use slurs of any kind. I have learned that eradicating prejudice requires active movement toward justice rather than finding passive comfort in imagining myself 'one of the good guys.' And given that open hostility against the LGBTQ+ community is still not uncommon, I understand why my statement led many to assume the worst. To be as clear as I can be, I stand with the LGBTQ community."