Jim Carrey keeps gun battle going

TORONTO – Canadian actor Jim Carrey isn’t backing down in his campaign against Americans who oppose gun control.

“I have been aghast at the level of hatred heaped upon me, my family and the people I work with over a mere difference of opinion on this issue,” Carrey wrote on Huffington Post. “It is shocking to see this concerted effort to brutally intimidate anyone who speaks of a compassionate compromise.

The Toronto native has been under fire since posting a Funny or Die video last week poking fun at gun lobbyists and their hero, the late National Rifle Association president Charlton Heston.

The video, Cold Dead Hand, sparked a debate on social media.

In his Huffington Post column, Carrey urged his critics not to “scream at those with a different opinion than ours to ‘f**k off and go back to Canada.'”

He wrote: “I will gladly go back and visit Canada as I have many friends and loved ones there. I am so proud of that country and everything it’s given to me, but I am also a naturalized American citizen and I have been bringing as much joy as I can to people in this country for 30 years. I care deeply about our future and I feel it’s my duty as a citizen to do everything in my power to make this a better place.”

The 51-year-old also addressed those who pointed out he has an armed bodyguard. “No one in my employ is allowed to carry a large magazine and NO ONE IS ASKING ANYONE TO GIVE UP THEIR RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS, though it is in the vested interests of those who profit by gun sales to make it seem so,” wrote Carrey. “It’s just the type of arms, the easy access and the means with which to cause massive devastation to good and innocent people that I hope we can limit. It’s the quality of mercy, the tiniest spark of empathy that I know lives in every one of us that I wish to ignite in you.”

Following the release of Cold Dead Hand, Fox News host Greg Gutfield called Carrey “a pathetic tool” and commentator Laura Ingram accused him of having a “cold, dead career.”

Carrey shot back that he would trade his career and his fame “if there were the slightest chance of preventing the anguish of another Columbine, Virginia Tech, Aurora, or Sandy Hook Elementary School.”