Shall we all take a moment to applaud Matt Damon? In a recent interview the actor offered an anecdote seemingly meant to signal not only the rapidly changing pace of political correctness, but also Damon’s admirable willingness to listen in and change with the times. Just months ago, he explained in the interview, after using the “f-slur for a homosexual” in a joke, his daughter “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.”
In a backlash that some will surely but ill-fittingly chalk up to cancel culture gone rampant, rather than a standing ovation to his supposed personal development, nearly everyone online shook their heads in dismay. Most were upset that it was up into this very year, presumably, that Damon was freely using the word without much thought to its harmful connotations. How could he be so oblivious, until only months ago, to its harm?
