I've degoogled and life is sweet.

Me too! Yesterday was my first day here, and Nicole was the last thing I got before I went to bed.

Please do. It was a good idea for the US to ban TikTok due to Chinese security law, and of course the worst man on earth granted it a reprieve.

Also, when are you guys going to denaturalize Musk? He cheated on his US citizenship, so I hold out a shred of hope that after his rampage is ended and it all wraps up, we'll revoke his citizenship as fraudulent and he'll have to return to a failed state that's following in Robert Mugabe's anti-white race war footsteps. Can't think of a better place on this earth for a Nazi to belong to.

Honestly, that sounds like a blessing in disguise.

Hehe, I actually joined my instance in no small part due to it already having taken anti tankie countermeasures. Don't need those people buzzing around like horseflies, I had a tankie father and my patience for that shit is basically zero.

Thanks for the recommends, neighbor!

Badge of honor, I reckon.

Yeah, I've gone through and did a bunch of subscribing and a little bit of blocking a handful of instances I know will flood my feed with stuff I find creepy. I actually spent a couple days deciding on the right instance to join. I'm looking forward to more people showing up, and it's nice that everyone I've interacted with so far has been pretty chill.

I have a suspicion that I was followed by a mod who banned me and accused me of "throwing a tantrum" and muting me from contacting him again when I asked him to justify his ban for "promoting violence" when I very plainly hadn't. I kept getting bans for the same thing across various other subs for similar non promotion of violence, rather laughing about the idea of a politician possessed by the ghost of GG Allin ruining their life with antics, and for harrassment for some post that wasn't even deleted when I got my ban, so I have no idea what it even was.

No time for that kind of nonsense. The "you're in trouble for liking the wrong comments" step is the final step into full mean girl pettiness. Reddit has become an HOA.

Budget enough to avoid buying a HiPoint or other gun with a really lousy trigger. That's no way to try to learn.

9mm is indeed the sweet spot between power and capacity, if you're using proper defensive ammo and not ball. 9mm ball can fail to stop attackers even after making a fatal wound and require follow on shots. And considering the unfortunate likelihood of having to go to trial to defend your actions, taking follow on shots to stop an attacker is something a prosecutor WILL use against you. Proper ammunition is essential when you carry. Cheap ball is great for the range, though.

If you're not concerned about needing all that capacity, though, and I think it's realistic not to expect drawn out gun battles going down, consider .45 ACP. A proper 9mm round will put someone down, but a .45 slug is like a big rock hurled by a furious sasquatch. It's gonna kick more, but it's not hard to manage with a little practice, and whoever decided they wanted to kill you isn't gonna ever be the same if they make it.

Safes are great, but even a locking case will do for a little while. More important than that, though, I feel is practice. Figure on 150-200 rounds to get a good feel for your gun, and then maybe 5 to 7 hundred rounds a year for maintenance, at a minimum. Handguns are harder to shoot accurately than people realize or tend to talk about in general. It's easy for people to do enough to get their permit, but if you're going to be going into the world prepared for a gunfight, you need to actually be fully prepared for a gunfight. Not just skilled enough to put your shots where you want them to go, but also with enough situational awareness to quickly judge what's behind a target and where and how bystanders are moving around.

That means budgeting for things like taking a tactical handgun course and finding a way to practice more than just hitting a mark on a range. Shooting isn't the same as shooting and moving.

Also, familiarize yourself with point shooting rather than lining up sights. "Bullseyes don't shoot back" is a good book on the subject.

There are companies that provide "legal insurance" of a fashion, where you pay a monthly fee and if you end up having to shoot in self defense, you'll have an attorney pretty much on retainer if you need it. It's something to consider. If you decide to go for it, read the terms and conditions carefully, you don't want to buy coverage up to $5000 or something and end up high and dry.

Don't skimp on ear and eye protection, and have fun!

Oregon is pretty good for this.

There's a ridiculous anti gun measure, prop. 114, that barely passed at the ballot box a few years ago, but was immediately blocked as unconstitutional. It would require law enforcement permission (paid, of course) to get a permit to buy a gun, ban magazines with any kind of capacity, and ban the scary guns.

But it's just not happening. Law enforcement is against it, the only judge that seems to support it is the federal one, and even people who voted for it realized it was terrible and now say they'd never support another attempt.

Our CC laws are pretty easy, healthcare for trans folk here is outstanding, and the drawbacks are that it's hard to find a job and the fact that the state's democratic party is deeply and openly corrupt, which plays out as your tax dollars just constantly disappearing with no accountability and PDX/Multnomah county being irredeemably dysfunctional as a result.

Of course it will.

I have to wonder if it's at all coincidental that this comes at the same time as the Crypto Reserve announcement. A few years back, Putin legalized money laundering in Russia with the introduction of an electronic ruble, and a 25% tax on e-ruble conversions to regular rubles when provenance of the e-ruble's source is not provided. An easy way to hide illegal transactions, and a nice cut for the state so Putin can take it for himself.