I now know more about this subject than I ever thought possible. Thank you, everyone, for your thoughtful replies. It is very much appreciated. :)

Okay, I understood about 5% of what you just said, but I think I get the general gist of it. Thanks for your reply.

Forgive me for being dense, but how can they have a security patch without the latest update? I’m speaking specifically of Linux Mint and the repositories that are used after a fresh install, here. In my experience (which may differ from yours), I’ve never had to regress to an earlier version of software due to the latest version having some kind of vulnerability. It’s just not something I’ve ever had to do, although I’m not ruling out the possibility that others have experienced this.