I sincerely wish they were not necessary. However we live in a world where people are attacked, raped, and murdered with enough frequency that owning a gun to defend yourself is reasonable.
A gun is not a "solution to crime" as you said. In the hands of a potential victim, it is a "preventative from the crime ever happening".
Coupled with the fact that even if you arm every single person capable with a gun, there's still going to be crime, you have to consider a balance. Some countries are doing very well without them.
Meanwhile a local elementary school is shot up… or a cinema… or a place of worship… or a high school… or another high school… or a concert…
If only those toddlers had firearms. Or those concert goers who were fired upon from 100s of yards away from an elevated position.
These things ONLY happen where guns are not controlled properly. Surely even if you believe in your 2nd amendment rights, you can see that there is a heavy price to pay to have that right. Pretending there isn’t is denying reality. Also pretending that right would stand a chance against the US military moving against the government or people is laughable. But logic is out the window on this topic… no one is going to change anyone’s mind here.
Figures on injuries are iffy in the US, for example the degree involved, but death is binary and since 1980 accidental deaths from firearms have gone from 800 to 500 a year, at the same time both the number of people in the US have increased by 50% and percentage armed have increased by even more. The latter probably due to the nationwide sweep of "shall issue" or better concealed carry regimes in states, now covering 42 states and ~75% of the nation's people.
One of the reasons this is a red hot issue it that it's the only failure of the Left's in its culture war on the Right, and it's a very big failure.