I agree - for who he was, Konzen did a great job of taking care of Goku - especially as it wasn't like he could have prepared for suddenly having this highly unique highly energetic kid foisted off on him.
While I agree that in some ways it was pretty unfortunate for Goku to basically be chained to Sanzo of all people, it seems unlikely that many "normal" people would be willing to look after a "cursed monster" like him - or able to. Maybe in an ideal world Goku would have had someone more open and nurturing, but as we've seen, the kind of people who have the power and mindset to be willing and able to look after Goku (and who he'd be willing to have look after him long-term) were all pretty heavily messed over by the road it took to attain that power and mindset.
(More basically, although this isn't really what you're getting at I think, I find it a bit difficult to fault Sanzo for his "child" rearing since apart from the fact that he grew up in an environment where children were taught rather than raised, Goku must have been a teenager when he found him and surely in that period in an agrarian society kids were expected to take on the duties and responsibilities of adults at that age. He doesn't treat Goku any differently than Gojyo (unless if anything more tolerantly), and while that seems unfair to us, it was probably standard mentality then. Whether his attitude overall is needlessly violent and abrasive is, of course, another topic. :D)
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-10-16 01:40 am (UTC)While I agree that in some ways it was pretty unfortunate for Goku to basically be chained to Sanzo of all people, it seems unlikely that many "normal" people would be willing to look after a "cursed monster" like him - or able to. Maybe in an ideal world Goku would have had someone more open and nurturing, but as we've seen, the kind of people who have the power and mindset to be willing and able to look after Goku (and who he'd be willing to have look after him long-term) were all pretty heavily messed over by the road it took to attain that power and mindset.
(More basically, although this isn't really what you're getting at I think, I find it a bit difficult to fault Sanzo for his "child" rearing since apart from the fact that he grew up in an environment where children were taught rather than raised, Goku must have been a teenager when he found him and surely in that period in an agrarian society kids were expected to take on the duties and responsibilities of adults at that age. He doesn't treat Goku any differently than Gojyo (unless if anything more tolerantly), and while that seems unfair to us, it was probably standard mentality then. Whether his attitude overall is needlessly violent and abrasive is, of course, another topic. :D)