I think that the biggest problem here is that most of the topics there are focused on earning money through signature campaigns and bounties (posted by users who's post quality is terrible) or on complaining about merit which as far as I noticed, was introduced at the beginning of this year. I agree with the OP.

You can always go to MyEtherWallet.com and generate a new wallet. You will be given a private key which you can later use for accessing your wallet. The best thing about it that you can do it even while being offline so there is less risk that some kind of malware steals your key. After you save your private key, you can encrypt it using for example VeraCrypt and store it on multiple external drives. Hardware wallets are much more convenient because all you have to do is to plug in a hardware wallet your computer and use it with MEW. I use my TREZOR One for small amounts of cryptocurrencies in case I needed to spend them immediately.

Every hardware wallet should be safer than a software wallet. Modern hardware wallets have built-in screens which help to check if the address wasn't changed by some sort of malware.

There are many other interesting cryptocurrencies which I would be if both Bitcoin and Ethereum disappeared. Zcash, Dash, IOTA are all interesting in my opinion and that's why I try to study them. I wouldn't go for XRP due to its centralized nature and associations with banks.

I have no idea why people are even trying to get into Bitcoin without being patient or knowing the risk. Bitcoin isn't old so there is some kind of uncertainty among well-known investors and governments which don't know whether or not they should ban Bitcoin.