Political fear mongering and the crime wave made anything the media represented as evil despite not being relevant. This is where the scary black guns came from. The weapons ban was the political result, this of course did nothing to prevent the school shootings that came about or the post officer shooters. AR-15s became popular because they are the actual best pdw for the price point and having the same build as a weapon veterans were familiar with for decades also helped. Media representation changed to scary assault rifles because of the 1994 ban. That’s why ar and ar-15 became conflated and a well used term before the Halo and MW generation.