Anybody who thinks a flare or CME cannot do large damage is uninformed. Such an occurrence could plunge an entire country or continent into the dark ages - taking months or years to recover. You don't need to be a particularly sharp individual to understand that the removal of electricity from society for an extended period of time will result in the emergence of a rather robust "competitive" environment (chaos). A lot of people will die from such a situation.
There is an alarmingly poor readiness level for such a prospect and it is far more likely than most phenomena that doomsday retards constantly obsess upon.
If that happens and your region loses power. Get your looting pants on.
Probably the most hilarious country for it to happen, would be the US - because of the amount of guns. If you've got a case of beans and I'm starving - well.. it's pistols at dawn and uhh, I don't even like beans
A (direct enough) gamma ray burst is highly unlikely and would result in complete sterilisation, so not really worth worrying about. There is at least one known star that is projected to be roughly aligned but I believe measurements have cleared it from being truly likely.