So I bought a self-defense gun....

the sad fate of media today, if you keep on tuning to media where hate fear and uncertainty is portrayed every minute.. you become so paranoid, very insecure and will resort to things that make you think a gun is the ultimate weapon.. feels great to have one.. nobody dares messing with you because of the gun.. Can't blame faux news for the ever growing gun issue in the US.. of course when there are school shootings and innocent kids are involved we just hear the chorus of "let's pray for..."

 

With regards to roadrage, now that you carry a firearm you really must avoid roadrage at all cost. The outcome of roadrage will be deadly, and you don't need that on your conscience, and you don't need to be a defendant. Risks are higher now that you carry. Like going to a sketch gas station. Don't do it now that you carry. Avoid those places more than ever

 

One also must keep in mind that even mainstream media (ie, not the outright propaganda outlets) will always show the most extreme elements of any event.

At the lowest level, this manifests as "why are the murders on the local news increasingly far away"? Local news loves to cover extreme crime events. Unfortunately for them the murder rate is currently not very high. So they have to look farther and farther afield to find content to fill the "horrible crime of the day" slot. It seems like the murder rate is constant, or even rising, but all that is happening is that they are covering larger and larger areas. With some exceptions - there are some local areas which actually have high enough murder rates to keep the outlets well fed. (There is also the "happy story of the day". This will often involve a cute animal or a child. If it is a child the story will either cover some great charitable work, having a dread disease and getting to play cop or fireman for a day, having a dread disease and the neighbors throw them a parade or a party, or their having called 911 when a parent/neighbor/teacher/etc. needed help, but only if that person recovered and is still present to say what a great kid this is.)

We had a mild earthquake (for California anyway) and the damage was really minor. However one building had a front wall collapse dramatically into the street. Every single major network ran a story about the earthquake and they all showed that one collapsed wall. If you had stood in front of that building and scanned up and down the street for a mile in either direction there wouldn't have been any other damage. When there is a protest they will only show the peaceful protestors if there isn't some crazy throwing fireworks, burning cars, or looting stores. Which there often are, so it seems like the world is on fire when only a small number of people are actually making trouble. (Pro tip - the people who loot stores during a protest typically have absolutely nothing to do with whatever protest is going on. They are just a bunch of low level criminals who wait around for a major distraction to keep the police busy so that they can steal some stuff. Certain parties love to conflate the two groups - "look, the protestors are criminals, they loot stores". Nope, the criminals come out to take advantage of the protests.)

Conversely, these same outlets are oddly pretty bad at showing the extent of major devastation. Put a drone up over the Eaton Canyon or Pacific Palisades fire areas and it just goes on and on and on. Gaza is another example. Instead they usually go for a ground shot that shows an area of half a block or so, or sometimes just a single building. Not saying they never put up the overview shots, but for some reason they prefer to show a small number of destroyed structures in detail over a very large number in lower resolution.

The number of people in the current protests (the anti ICE ones) is not all that large, and they aren't all that violent. Compared for instance to the riots after the Rodney King decision, where there were structure fires all over the area and the whole basin was filled with smoke. The LAPD and Sheriff's departments were not overwhelmed by the current protestors. Had they been the Mayor would have been making a big show of asking for the National Guard, and the Governor would have made an equally big show about sending them. These two politicians may not be fond of the current incarnation of ICE, but that doesn't mean they are pro-riot. So sending in the National Guard wasn't yet necessary, and sending in the Marines was completely over the top (and I believe completely unprecedented). The marines weren't even MPs, just regular troops. "Restoring order" wasn't actually the point of sending either group, even though that is the reason given, and I will leave it at that.

 

Sage advice.
I always advise people that if there's a place that they would not go without being armed then they darned sure shouldn't go there ARMED!
If you're the type of person who reacts badly to being tailgated, brake-checked, cut off, etc then leave the weapons at home and be one of those people that use dashcams instead.

 

ETC and I do not always agree, but when we do, we do.

 

Adults may chose to disagree, agreeably.

Opinions are opinions.
Truth is truth.