**TLDR: 2nd Amendment Rights aside, America has such a surplus of guns to population that placing a ban on firearms would create a huge imbalance of power between criminals with guns and law-abiding citizens without** I am completely anti-firearm. I live in the UK however, where firearms have never really been an issue outside of sport and the occasional spot of gang violence. The majority of our police are unarmed and deal with threats using negotiation and non-lethal tactics. I do not see this as ever being a possibility in America because there are just too many guns circulating the country. It is estimated that there are 400 million guns in circulation in a America, which has a population of 328 million [1]. What this means is that if America were to place a ban on guns, there would still be plenty for the criminals to get their hands on (something that is harder to do in the UK, thus civilians don't need firearms). Different schemes have been implemented by various countries over the years to remove guns from circulation. New Zealand for example, tried a buyback scheme when it voted for the banning of semi-automatic weapons in the wake of the Christchurch attack. However the effectiveness of this scheme has been called into question by some groups, who say we cannot know how many guns are in circulation, and based on what we do know, the number of voluntary surrenders was far lower than what is out there [2]. Ultimately, America's history of reliance on guns as a form of personal protection means that it has sealed its fate in terms of whether or not its population can be armed. I cannot see a possible way that it can disarm its populace without leaving it at the mercy of armed criminals. REFERENCES [1] https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/07/13/three-million-more-guns-the-spring-2020-spike-in-firearm-sales/#:~:text=There%20are%20more%20guns%20than,firearm%20for%20every%2020%20Americans. [2] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/20/questions-raised-about-new-zealands-gun-buyback-scheme-as-amnesty-ends

**It would be extremely difficult, but it's possible it could be done voluntarily over several or perhaps many generations.** - It does seem fairly clear that it would be super difficult, and likely impossible, to get rid of guns in our current context. As mentioned above, there are just too many of them around to ever really get rid of them. And putting anti-gun laws in place probably can't ever fully circumvent that. - However, it's possible that we could teach new generations, and over time, arrive at a place where guns are naturally disregarded and even feared by nearly everyone. Similar to the idea of refraining from instilling racism in kids - doing that may prove to stamp out racism eventually and somewhat naturally. (Of course, it's complicated, and may not work out quite like such, but it's still possible.) - So if we literally made sure to teach our kids from the time they are very little to think about guns and hopefully see them as harmful and unnecessary, eventually perhaps nearly everyone in the country or even worldwide would come to voluntarily dispose of guns and cease making new ones. It might take several or even lots of generations to reach that point, since the most imminent generations will face many parents who teach them the opposite. But get enough people across several generations to disregard guns and the attitude could eventually shift to the point where even the hold-outs can no longer teach their children to love, desire, or at least tolerate guns. - Now, the other problem is that there would likely always be people who still want the guns and who would still likely have access to firearms even in my most radically idealistic, utopian vision of generations-down-the-line gun ridding. So the argument above regarding criminals with their firearms would probably still stand. But I still hold some hope that there could eventually be enough people to persuade hold-outs of both the less severe and severe kind (i.e., people who want guns just for protection, and then the more sort of "criminals" who want them to actively do harm.) And in doing so, guns could be disposed of voluntarily and kept banished even in a country where it seems impossible from today's viewpoint. It would just maybe take many, many generations to reach that point, if that's what we (and the up-and-comers) want to reach.