Self Defense is a personal thing

It is not the burden of Law Enforcement to keep individuals safe from harm.
Our personal safety is our own obligation to ourselves.   Some of us feel this, and are alright with it, while others would rather leave their fate to the odds, or to the chance that someone with more grit than they would come to their defense.

But those of us who get it, know that we alone are our protector.  We also know that it could well happen that we find ourselves defending those who cannot, or will not, defend themselves.
I love to shoot my firearms.  And I love trying to top the previous day with today's shooting.  Unlike a regimented, public, range; using a "home range", I can conduct myself as I choose.  I don't sit at a bench, and shoot at a 2 foot target, hoping to stay on the paper.   I shoot a 6 inch target, (about the size of a human skull),  and am always trying to bring the shoot group into a smaller diameter.
I shoot every weapon I own, regularly, but the one that I shoot most, (because of economy and the fun of "running a lever"), is my Henry .22 Carbine.  Not a wall hanger,  but an every day shootin' iron. I shoot my AR-15 often enough to keep proficient in how it handles, feeling that if I can hit it with the .22, then I can damned sure hit it with the AR-15, and harder.
 I shoot my handguns much the same.  I shoot my "everyday carry" about once a week, while I shoot a "sub -caliber", daily in my handgun exercise.  I have a look alike S&W .40 Cal chambered in .177 BB.  It has a really crude, rough, trigger, that actually helps my aim with my "carry weapon", by making me concentrate on trigger pull.

This is the result that I produce, consistently, only because I see the value in being able to perforate at the point that you most desire. 

This is the firearm that gives me both pleasure in the shooting, and the security of knowing that I can put the heat where it needs to be.

I don't expect anyone else to be obligated to protect me, my goods, or my life.  I have felt, for years, that all that I have is essential to my enjoyment of life, and that for anyone to attempt to take any of that would be to endanger my enjoyment of my God given life, and I would respond in kind.