Matt Damon Apologizes for Comments About Sexual Misconduct: 'Really Wish I'd Listened a Lot More'

"I really wish I'd listened a lot more before I weighed in on this," Damon said. "I don't want to further anybody's pain with anything that I do or say. So for that I am really sorry."

The apology comes after the "Downsizing" star was publicly criticized for sharing his not-so-well received thoughts on sexual harassment in Hollywood during an interview on ABC News.

"There's a difference between... patting someone on the butt and rape or child molestation, right? Both of those behaviors need to be confronted and eradicated without question, but they shouldn't be conflated, right," Damon said during the interview. "We're so energized to kind of get retribution, I think."

"All of that behavior needs to be confronted, but there is a continuum and on this end of the continuum where you have rape and child molestation or whatever, you know, that's prison. Right? And that's what needs to happen... That's criminal behavior, and it needs to be dealt with that way," he added. "The other stuff is just kind of shameful and gross. I just think that we have to kind of start delineating between what these behaviors are."

Days later, Alyssa Milano and his "Good Will Hunting" co-star and ex-girlfriend Minnie Driver put the actor on blast on Twitter.

"There are so many men I love who do NOT frame the differentiation between sexual misconduct and assault and rape as an excuse or worse -- our problem. Such bollocks," Driver said. "Gosh it's so interesting how men with all these opinions about women's differentiation between sexual misconduct, assault and rape reveal themselves to be utterly tone deaf and as a result, systemically part of the problem."

"Dear Matt Damon, It's the micro that makes the macro. We are in a 'culture of outrage' because the magnitude of rage is, in fact, overtly outrageous. And it is righteous. I have been a victim of each component of the sexual assault spectrum of which you speak. They all hurt and they are all connected to a patriarchy intertwined with normalized, accepted -- even welcomed misogyny," Milano added. "We are not outraged because someone grabbed our asses in a picture. We are outraged because we were made to feel this was normal. We are outraged because we have been gaslighted. We are outraged because we were silenced for so long. There are different stages of cancer. Some more treatable than others, but it's still cancer. Sexual harassment, misconduct, assault and violence is a systemic disease. The tumor is being cut out right now with no anesthesia. Please send flowers."

Shortly after, a petition was created with over 20,000 people demanding that the actor's cameo in "Ocean's 8" be cut.