Jim Carrey’s Biggest Career Scandal Is a Controversial View Experts Can’t Stand
Jim Carrey is a Hollywood superstar who rose to fame in over-the-top comedies such as The Mask and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. Carrey remains active in Hollywood, and recently begun making waves on Saturday Night Live, portraying Joe Biden.
Although Carrey has millions of fans all around the world, he has been the subject of some controversy over the course of his legendary career. Most notably, Carrey has come under fire for his very controversial views on vaccines.
What is Jim Carrey best known for?
Carrey first rose to fame in the early ’90s, following a stint on the groundbreaking TV series, In Living Color. Carrey stood apart from other comedians at the time for his outrageous physical comedy routines and his seemingly elastic facial expressions.
Audiences couldn’t get enough of the talented comedian, and his work in movies like Dumb and Dumber and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective further solidified his status as a Hollywood mainstay.
Throughout the 2000s, Carrey’s star rose even higher with appearances in dramatic films, including Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. While Carrey wasn’t always popular with critics for the first several decades of his career, most viewers loved him, and many have called upon critics to recognize Carrey’s work in movies such as Man on the Moon.
Still, Carrey hasn’t always been the subject of positive headlines, and the beginning of his romance with actress and TV personality Jenny McCarthy signaled the start of a rocky relationship between Carrey and the media.
Jim Carrey’s controversial vaccine views
For the early part of his career, Carrey kept his private life relatively under-the-radar. Still, when he met former Playboy model Jenny McCarthy in the summer of 2005, he seemed to shift his approach to a more public persona.
Carrey and McCarthy went public with their relationship in 2006, and for several years, were one of the most high-profile couples in Hollywood. McCarthy, an outspoken opponent of childhood vaccinations, swept Carrey up in a tidal wave of controversy, and soon, he was speaking out against vaccinations as well.
In 2009, Carrey wrote an article for the Huffington Post, where he slammed mandatory childhood vaccinations. In the article, Carrey wrote: “In this growing crisis, we cannot afford to blindly trumpet the agenda of the CDC, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) or vaccine makers. Now more than ever, we must resist the urge to close this book before it’s been written.”
Later, he also called out the governor of California for his stance on mandatory vaccinations, in a Twitter rampage that got a lot of engaged responses from followers — as well as a number of replies from people who agreed with Carrey’s unconventional stance.
Is Jim Carrey against vaccinations?
Carrey earned significant backlash for his stance on vaccinations, with many scientists, as well as critics, slamming him for his views.
One scientist, who works as director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, wrote that Carrey’s “misinformation” regarding vaccines is dangerous, stating: “He’s an actor. Does he know the science? I don’t think so.”
Still, Carrey has openly claimed that he is not actually against all vaccinations, stating in a tweet that he is simply “anti-neurotoxin.” While a number of scientists dispute the anti-vaccination movement in general, Carrey has drawn ire due to his high-profile status.
If the chatter bothers Carrey, he hasn’t let on — rather, he has remained outspoken on the issues that matter to him, no matter the consequences.
