What event caused you to start?
I was in elementary school when I first started to pay attention. President Kennedy was killed and I started to question what I was told by the news on TV and what my family read in the newspapers. Back then... we only had three channels of TV... and those were limited in hours on the air.
Later... instead of staying up nights and watching sci fi and monster movies... I would sneak on the TV and find William F. Buckley's show Firing Line and I became a student of Conservatism. I actually was watching live when Buckley darted his tongue from side to side... kicked his head back and to one side... and eviscerated gore vidal... man he left that poofter in a pile of bloody guts!
I minored in World and American History in college. I took pre law just to expand my knowledge. I had to hide under my desk from Ivan nuking me... my school had operational Geiger counters. I lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis and I saw the communists in hollywood creep out of the shadows and they and the media started their clandestine revolution. My father taught me that the only good commie is a dead commie... that America and Americans were special and then he spent a lifetime proving it to me.
That is why when I came of age... I started to prepare. Not exactly like the TV series but if it gets as bad as those people say... then a fortress will only stand so long and no one will be safe without numbers... and that is where I think it will go worst case.
Many of us will be busy rebuilding this republic as envisioned by our Founders and we will separate from those that do not want to follow that path. We will be too busy defending and rebuilding to sink into total anarchy. If I am wrong... I am still better prepared than most.
LLS