Kevin Hart has spent a long time reflecting on the “necessary and needed” backlash against his past homophobic jokes.

The 44-year-old comedian stepped down from hosting the Oscars in 2018 after old X, formerly Twitter, posts of his resurfaced, many of which used anti-gay slurs, including one that stated “if my son comes home & try’s 2 play with my daughters doll house I’m going 2 break it over his head.”

While Hart initially downplayed the comments, he later apologized and acknowledged the impact of his words. The actor has since further expanded on his change of heart, recently telling the Wall Street Journal about his “come-to-Jesus moment.”

“Sometimes it’s okay to take a step back and to be educated. I got a crash course,” he said. “It was one that was necessary and needed.”

It took two days from when Hart was announced as host for the backlash over his tweets to cause him to back out. He first said that people should “stop searching for reasons to be angry” and refused to apologize, but just days after issued an apology for “my insensitive words from my past” while stepping down as host.

After being condemned by figures such as Billy Porter and Don Lemon, Hart went on Ellen DeGeneres’s show for a controversial segment in which the host said she “forgave” him, and the comedian insisted calling him homophobic amounted to “slander.” He then went on another show to blame audiences for not understanding comedy, saying that “if people choose to take offense to something, then that’s a choice.”

A year later, Hart released a Netflix docuseries chronicling what he went through in the aftermath of the controversy. The title, Don’t Fuck This Up, was a sentiment he would express again shortly after, when he opened up about his conversations with gay friends like DeGeneres, Wanda Sykes, and Lee Daniels that made him realize “oh, shit — I did fuck up.”

“I’m a firm believer in laying in the bed that you made. If there’s something that you did, then you did it. You know, there’s no wiggle room around it. You can address it, and then you can move on,” Hart said. “With the whole Oscars thing, there was a big gap between what I thought the problem was versus what the problem really was. … I don’t care if you’re gay or not gay. I’m a people person. I’m going to love you regardless.”

Source: advocate.com