Well, the secret of Luffy's heritage was kept till the "reveal" at Marineford. At that point Dragon himself basically stated, that Luffy gained enough strength to protect himself. Before that he probably kept it a secret to protect Luffy from the World Government (look at Ace) and to give him the chance to decide what do to with his life. He didn't want to drag Luffy into the dangers of being a revolutionary.

Sabo had nothing to lose and nowhere to go after the events at Gray Terminal where Dragon met him and Nico Robin is part of Luffy's crew, so he indirectly helped him.

 

No. Bullshit. Look how Sabo turned out. Dragon could have just as easily kept Luffy close to him and made him strong very, very early. Ditching him somewhere with barely any protection means nothing, especially considering all the times Luffy almost died before even setting foot off the island.

The 'dangerous' excuse went out the window the moment Dragon decided to adopt Sabo. Hell, he was literally on the same island as Luffy and decided to ditch his son and instead take the random kid with him. That is top tier bullshit.

I sincerely hope when Dragon eventually does excuse himself he'll have something better than 'it was too dangerous to have you with me'. Something much, much better.

 

Again, I would accept that if Dragon had not taken in and raised a kid from Luffy's island. Any argument made for not raising Luffy should also apply to Sabo, and that 'Sabo didn't have anything to lose' doesn't change that. Luffy didn't at that point, either. And either way, nothing stopped Dragon from saving Sabo, giving him some supplies and letting him go in a peaceful town or whatever.

Instead he took him in, raised and trained him and in the end Sabo ended up being his second in command. All (except arguably the last) actions that should have rightfully gone to Luffy. If Dragon felt like mentoring anyone, it should have been his son.

It's not like Luffy had too much of a choice. If it wasn't Dragon it would have been Garp and if it wasn't him it would have been Shanks. At that age, any strong person who showed him kindness would have affected him majorly him because he was freaking abandoned. You can't even fault Shanks or Garp for their influence, as Luffy would have been dead many times over without them. Ace, too, for that matter.

All Dragon did was ensure Luffy would not be a revolutionary. By removing Luffy from his protection, he actually made it much more dangerous for Luffy, at least for first several years, as evidenced by canon itself.

I suppose I can see why some people wouldn't be bothered. It bothers me though, and I do hope Dragon eventually explains himself adequately.

 

He didn't just adopt him. Sabo's boat was shot by that noble (gained amnesia) and Dragon saved his life.

Spoiler

The chapter suggested, that Dragon believed in Roger's saying that freedom is the most valuable treasure. So he left Luffy to decide for himself what to with his life outside any revolutionary influence.

 

I know. Check my last post.

 

We don't know anything about their time together. Maybe Dragon gave Sabo the chance to leave and he wanted to stay. Maybe Sabo started like everybody else in the Revolutionary Army and rose in rank because of his skill.

Ignoring what was already written about people deciding for themselves what to do with their life, which Sabo did.

Spoiler

Being the second in command and son of the most wanted man is not exactly safe either with CP9, CP0 and who else gunning for you.

 

Pretty sure that by the time Sabo was high ranked enough to be in actual danger, Luffy had already started his journey, or at least wasn't far from starting.

Sabo was safe for the formative years of his life at least. Dragon wouldn't send him out untrained or unprotected (unless canon reveals later disprove this). No doubt Sabo made the conscious choice to join the war effort, but he was protected until he did.

On the other hand, Luffy was far from safe on that island. Hell, all Dragon needed to do to understand exactly how dangerous it was there for Luffy was ask Sabo himself, which he presumably did and proceeded to give approximately zero fucks about, or just gave zero fucks from the start and didn't ask at all.

 

Sabo chose to leave, yes, and I can see Dragon saving the kid. But choosing to leave one shitty island is not the same as choosing to join the revolution. As I said, Dragon could have left him somewhere or otherwise provided for him without having him join the revolution. I'm sure he had the means to do so.

We don't know how or when the second choice happened, but if presumably we respect Sabo's choice to become a member of the revolution and accept that it was indeed his own choice instead of the result of being raised and trained by the revolutionaries, then the same could have applied to Luffy.

 

Sabo had amnesia and as far as Dragon was concerned Luffy was living in the Windmill village with Makino and the rest, which is as safe as it can get in One Piece.
Edit:

Maybe he offered and Sabo declined, we can't know at this point.

 

Then he either kept no tabs on his son at all (else he would have known about the times Luffy had been in danger, even if well after the fact) or he knew and didn't think much of it. Neither option is one I like. If there's a third option, I'm all ears.

Sabo was, what 11 by that point?

 

And he still said stuff like this.

Spoiler

Rob Lucci was 13 when he killed 500 hostages, Nico Robin was 8 when Kuzan sent her on her way and Doflafmingo was 10 when he killed his father to get back to Mariejois. Age doesn't matter.

Dragon is the son of Garp. He probably received the same Fist of Love-treatment as Luffy. Who knows what he considers as a danger.

 

So a few determined words from a despairing kid are enough to tingle Dragon's recruitment sense? Is that all it takes?

Hell, Luffy could've managed the same and been with his father all along if given the opportunity.

Arguable, since I think that even in the world of One Piece age does matter to a degree, but okay. I'll agree that it doesn't more than it does. Again, this also applies to Luffy himself, not just Sabo. You can't apply one standard to one and not the other.

You can't even argue that the different standards applied to Luffy are for his own good as a product of Dragon's fatherly love, as all they do is place Luffy in more danger than Sabo, with less tools to work with.

Life-threatening. If Dragon doesn't care that Luffy is on life-threatening situations, then ... I don't know. I want to say that he doesn't view Luffy in a very fatherly way and thus shouldn't have any issues with raising him in the revolution in the first place but ... this is the One Piece world. People do crazy shit for the stupidest reasons.

In the end, it all stems from the fact that Luffy is there because of plot and that perhaps Dragon's (and Sabo's)particulars hadn't been hushed out yet at the behinning of the series. Oda is of the extremely few who rarely has stuff happen without adequate foreshadowing or justification, but I believe that this is one such case.

At this point we may have talked too much about this. I'm dissatisfied with the explanations we've gotten so far (or the lack of them), and I know that I'm not the only one, but also that many other people aren't.

I guess we'll see what Oda comes up with.

 

Let's leave it at that.

After the talk about Luffy joining his father as a kid, how about another divergent point. How do you think things would have played out if the Bluejam Pirates managed to escape and took Ace and Luffy with them?

 

My memory of the events is a bit blurry, but didn't that happen around the time of the fire? That means Dragon was on the island.

The Bluejam Pirates wouldn't have gotten far.

 

Tbh we don't know how much Dragon kept an eye on his son or not (and also what about his wife??). We know from Ivankov that nobody from the revolutionary army knew about his family, but Dragon did think of them often. Moreover, he had Garp- one of the most powerful marines around- looking after Luffy, and he did drop by in Loguetown too (presumably saving Luffy from execution, and definitely saving him from Smoker).
In fact we don't know why he was in Goa back when he decided to save Sabo, it could have been to check up on Luffy.

As for why he didn't drag Luffy around but did with Sabo- it's a bit hard to tell. As Sanji has shown us; there are a lot of blank spaces around quite a few of the Straw Hats. Maybe Luffy used to be with his mother originally, but she died off? Maybe when he was born it was a particularly dangerous period on the seas (won't have been too long after rogers death, now that you think about it) so Dragon left him in a relatively stable environment?
Eh, not really bothered about it because I'm sure Oda has some method to his madness.

Also Lola- from the Moria arc- is probably Big Mom's daughter. I called it a while back, but I think it'll come into play soon.

 

CheddarTrek, can you stop reiterating and giving credence to the crocomom theory?

 

It's gotta be the Ninja-Pirate-Mink alliance.

Can't leave the Ninja out.

Also, Luffy once more proves hes best Shounen protag with his handling of Momonosuke