But flat earthers are apparently real. There really are people out there who think the world is flat, and at this point in our scientific advancement, that’s pretty dumb. It’s been dumb since Pythagoras in 500 B.C. After years of research, data gathering, and going up into space to take a look-see, we know pretty full well that the Earth is ball-shaped. We laugh at the people who still claim the Earth is flat in the same way we laugh at people who vote for the Green Party or put raisins in potato salad, Karen.

The key point here is that humanity should pretty well know when something is a bad idea, yet thanks to the promise of power and no small addiction to pride, many people are content to go on pushing that their bad idea is actually good, and doing everything in their power to convince others to agree with them.

When you push this to something on a national, or even world level, you get concepts that should have died long ago that thrive well beyond their expiration date. These ideas include socialism, fruit cake, and gun control.

After every mass shooting, the same thing happens. Before the blood on the ground has a chance to dry, gun control advocates get on social media, and or stand in front of any camera they can find, and begin harping on about how something needs to be done to get these guns off the streets.

Many openly say that what we need is just to ban guns. Before I get responses of “we don’t want to ban all guns, just these specific types,” I’m going to have to stop you. The article below is a deeper look into how that claim is a complete lie.

(READ: Yes, They DO Want To Take Your Guns Away. They Do.)

The savvier ones tell you that they just want to get rid of certain kinds of guns, but in the end, the ultimate goal is to make America a gun-free place to be.

The problem here is two-fold. Not only will guns not make America safer, but you also will never get rid of all the guns in America at this point. It is an impossibility on par with a flat Earth.

Guns are definitely used maliciously in our country. There’s no denying that, but instead of looking at the gun, we can look into factors that lead to the use of the gun. Seeing as how a gun has no powers to convince someone of anything, nor any way for it to act independently, other factors have to be involved before the gun is misused.

Some quick facts…

There are, on average, around 30,000 deaths by gun each year, but these deaths aren’t all bad guys killing good people.

Suicides make up the most gun deaths by nearly two-thirds. While tragic, a gun can hardly be considered at fault here. People who want to commit suicide will find a way to do it with or without a gun. The World Health Organization found that countries with the highest restrictions on guns had comparable suicide rates with the United States. If we were to eliminate that amount, we would already be down a significant chunk of around 20,000.

Homicides come next while it varies from year to year, it hovers around 10,000 to 12,000. Stats show that anywhere from 15 to 33 percent of that is from gang or drug crime. On top of that, over 50 percent of murders occur in 2 percent of the nation’s 3,142 counties.

Then there are homicides from guns used in self-defense, which according to a CDC report is more substantial than many believe:

Estimates of gun use for self-defense vary widely, in part due to definitional differences for self-defensive gun use; different data sources; and questions about accuracy of data, particularly when self-reported. The NCVS has estimated 60,000 to 120,000 defensive uses of guns per year. On the basis of data from 1992 and 1994, the NCVS found 116,000 incidents (McDowall et al., 1998). Another body of research estimated annual gun use for self-defense to be much higher, up to 2.5 million incidents, suggesting that self-defense can be an important crime deterrent (Kleck and Gertz, 1995). Some studies on the association between self-defensive gun use and injury or loss to the victim have found less loss and injury when a firearm is used (Kleck, 2001b).

The long and short of it is, our gun crime problem isn’t actually a national epidemic. We have a severe problem with suicides, which is a mental health issue, and a consistent gun crime problem in specific counties in the country, which is more of a gang/drug problem than a gun problem.

Even when it comes to mass shooters, a favorite focus of the media — not the troubled neighborhoods for some reason — we can see that nearly all of them had a long history of mental illness and troubled pasts.

What’s more, getting rid of guns doesn’t curb violence. The UK has experienced a 50 percent rise in knife crime, overtaking New York in murders.

Clearly, guns aren’t the problem. There are deeper causes.

But let’s say Democrats get their wish and we ban guns. Somehow, lightning struck three times in a row and somehow the nation rallied around the cause by the majorities necessary in every state to change the Constitution. What happens?

There will likely be a chunk of Americans who turn in their guns, but I’m guessing by the way Americans rush to gun stores whenever a Democrat so much as glances at a gun, the majority won’t. Registering guns was never something Americans found it good to do, and for good reason. Our country was founded on skepticism of power, and from the word “We the People,” we’ve been pretty clear that it’s none of your damn business how armed we are.

It’s likely that a majority of Americans will keep their guns, be they law-abiding or criminals. From here, the powers that be will have to face a myriad of problems. There is a conservative estimate of 357 million guns floating around the United States, and many of them will still be on the loose. Quite a few of them will wind up in black markets and purchased by criminals looking to take advantage of a gunless population. Crime and murder will skyrocket.

Many will stay in homes where the government can’t get to them. In order for the government to get those guns, they’d have to issue warrants. In order to issue warrants, you have to have probable cause.

That would take a long time, and many law-abiding Americans aren’t going to give a probable cause. In order to access people’s homes to get all the guns out of America, you’d need to go door to door, searching homes.

And the Fourth Amendment would like to have a word with you about that.

I haven’t even mentioned the possible uprisings that would start to happen as a result of all of this rights squashing and crime spiking, but that’s a different article.

In any case, the point is clear. A gunless America is an impossibility on par with a flat Earth. The numbers don’t support it, and the process doesn’t support it. Our God-given rights don’t support it. What’s more, the majority of the population of the United States of America doesn’t support it.