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Luffy’s childhood; abandonment issues, parental negelect and loneliness
When we talk about the one piece character’s childhoods, it’s usually the darker sides of the series. Oda has a nack of giving most of the characters terrible childhoods and backgrounds, which usually shapes these characters.
Oda does not shy away from that with the Straw Hats either; notable members such as Sanji, Nami and Robin has been seen as one of the most saddest childhoods. Hell, all straw hat members have had a bad childhood; including Luffy.
Not many people really care/see Luffy’s childhood as a terrible one, which I quite disagree with, because, really, Luffy did have a not-so-good childhood.
We know little to nothing about his really early days, but we can assume Garp took care of him. Until Oda says something about it, we can only speculate. But we do know that Garp was a terrible parental figure, making Luffy, a child at that time, go through many dangerous situation, which might’ve been for comical reasons, but I’ll get to that later.
So already from the start Luffy didn’t have a stable life or parental figure. Enter Shanks. Shanks was like a light for Luffy, becoming his idol through and through. It is most likely that Luffy and Shanks were quite close, because of the canon fact that Shanks and the crew stationed themeselves at Foosha village for nearly a year.
And then Luffy eats a devil fruit and Shanks looses his arm. We already know that Luffy was broken from the fact that Shanks lost an arm and blamed himself. Little guy felt so guilty, which is the worst feeling in the world. Shanks leave not long after, leaving behind a child with a hat. We all know Luffy looked up to Shanks a lot, and Shanks was probably one of the first actual parental figures for Luffy. I don’t think Luffy really felt abandoned per see, but there was something, hell he was crying buckets when Shanks had to leave. Everyone hates to say goodbye to someone you love/look up to, especially if you’re a child with not a lot to lose.
And then Garp, good ‘ol grandpa, dumps him onto some stranger away from the village that Luffy most likely grew up in. Garp dumped him somewhere dangerous without any care in the world. Ace and Sabo didn’t even want to have anything to do with Luffy at the start, yet Luffy tried his hardest to befriend them, probably because of his abandoned issues and the fact that he hates being alone. Imagine you’re dumped in a new place full of strangers, bandits, and the two kids nearly your age tie you to a tree and argue which of then should k!ll you. You just didn’t want to be lonely.
And not to mention all the times Luffy was kidnapped/beaten by bandits and pirates alike. He was kidnapped and t//tured by bluejam, and he was what, 7 years old? No child deserves that.
And then he finally gets some stability again, he got big brothers now and a dream that grows every day, despite Garp trying to snuff it out like a match. And then a part of that stability is gone, Sabo died. We know it took a heavy toll on Luffy, and why wouldnt it? Luffy loves people too hard, too scared to be alone, which makes a loss harder. We can see that it ‘caused some drift between him and Ace for a little period, to the point Luffy got mauled by a bear because they were too used to having Sabo around and Ace trying to push Luffy to be stronger.
Luffy is terrified of loosing Ace as a result of Sabo’s death. He is terrified to be alone, probably ‘cause he most likely grew up lonely, he didn’t have anyone to care for him, at least not a long time, only temporary, something that Luffy probably was used to. He gets more worried about Ace, terrified he will be gone too like Sabo, which doesn’t help his issues at all.
The reason why many brush it off is because of the ‘comedic’ way it’s shown. Probably because it’s from Luffy’s narrative (or maybe Oda just saw it as comedic, who knows) which tunes it way down and leaves people with a more lighter impression. Which makes sense, because that is how Luffy sees the world, but it’s still saddening when you look more between the lines.
Luffy was a kid, negelected by many adults, lonely with a handful of people he loved, no stability in his life, greif and guilty stricked from certain moments in his early life and a fear of loneliness, clinging desprately at the people he had left.
Most beautiful dude on the planet
𝙶𝚘𝚍 𝚌𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚖𝚎𝚗 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚐𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚞𝚜 𝚁𝚒𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚍 𝙺𝚛𝚞𝚜𝚙𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚊𝚗 𝚊𝚙𝚘𝚕𝚘𝚐𝚢 ~
omgomgomgogmgognfjfhdkdbdkbskfnndndjdbdjd
Fanart for one of my favorite fics at the moment, created by the lovely @manofthepipis I made this in light of the most recent chapter! Clicks opening the door to just see a 10 foot plus robot that caused him trauma like a week ago was actually pretty fun to illustrate!
