Facing a backlash after he was quoted saying he had recently decided to “retire” a homophobic slur, the actor Matt Damon said in a statement on Monday that “I do not use slurs of any kind.” The statement followed an interview published this week by The Sunday Times in which Mr.
Damon recounted a conversation with his daughter during which he “made a joke” that moved her to write him an essay on the historical harm of what she calls “the ‘f-slur for a homosexual.’” “She went to her room and wrote a very long, beautiful treatise on how that word is dangerous,” Mr.
Damon said, according to The Sunday Times, a British newspaper. “I said, ‘I retire the f-slur!’ I understood.” In the statement, which was obtained by Variety, Mr.