Because it worked. It didn't just work, Gohan unlocked a brand new Super Saiyan transformation. Goku got a gift-with-purchase for his war crime. It worked out better than he could have ever imagined.
I mean, yeah, he died but he's fine with that. He chooses to remain dead, once again romanticizing parental neglect by saying that Goku abandoning his 12-year-old son and pregnant wife to stay in the afterlife is totes the right thing to do 'cause his continued existence threatens the Earth somehow.
And then seven years later he does the exact same thing with Goten and Trunks, who are 7 and 8 respectively, because Child Soldiers worked so well the first time that why not go for another round?
edited 30th Aug '16 9:34:15 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
Exactly. The narrative contorts to justify Goku's terrible decisions even as it condemns other characters for the same choices. That's Protagonist-Centered Morality in a nutshell.
In essence, the Cell Games asserts that putting guns in children's hands is a morally-acceptable action if the children can actually win you the war.
edited 30th Aug '16 9:36:40 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Nope. Narrative contorting would be if Goku just randomly went "Lol Gohan now you fight!" and then Gohan magically displayed amazing power that was never hinted at. But that's not what happened. Gohan amazing power was a running thing about him since his introduction, Goku simply capitalized on it. He didn't blindly toss Gohan to see what happens, he knew for a fact that Gohan is in fact way stronger than Cell.
And condemning other characters for the same thing? Who, Piccolo? He wasn't condemned in Sayian saga, it was Gohan who was condemned for being a crybaby who kept ruining their plans and having to be saved. Piccolo went down in a blaze of glory, while the lesson for Gohan was that he must man up and pull his weight from now on, which admittedly worked to various levels of success.
But it didn't. Deus ex Android 16 showed up in the nick of time to fix Goku's error and make Gohan work. Even then, the assertion is ultimately that Goku's mistake was not explaining things. Goku's decision to turn Gohan into a WMD and unleash him on Cell, meanwhile, is entirely rewarded.
Piccolo is condemned because the plan blows up in the face and nobody shows up to salvage it until he's already recognized his error, abandoned the plan, and then redeemed himself by dying to protect Gohan. And then Goku arrives to save the day and, now that Piccolo has been punished for his misdeeds and repented them, Gohan is free to help Goku overcome Vegeta.
edited 30th Aug '16 9:55:03 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Again, the lesson from Gohan performance in Sayian saga wasn't "Oh it was so horrible for Piccolo to drag him into this", it was "Gohan better shape up so this won't happen again". Piccolo doesn't "die for his misdeeds", he dies covering for Gohan's weakness and the letter feels suitably guilty about letting that happen.
Different readings. But honestly, even if that were the case, it doesn't make it any better. It just means the series is romanticizing Child Soldiers even harder.
Since he was 4, people have been trying to make Gohan into a WMD. That's why Chi-Chi's upset. And she is right to be so.
edited 30th Aug '16 10:09:22 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.It's not "romanticizing" it's treating it's realistically for the setting the story it's in. It's easy to condemn training a child for life or death battles when you live in a society which provides a protection that means that there's a slim chance such training would be needed.
But in a situation where such a protection might as well no exist, given how impotent normal people are, and where sometimes the ability to fight means the difference between life and death it would be criminally negligent not to train your child to be a strong as he can possibly be, to give him the best possible chance of protecting himself and others. And that's how the situation looks for Goku and Gohan.
A parent primary job is not to coddle a child, but to preparer him to live in a world, however good or bad that world might be. And for Gohan that means that occasionally a super powerful beings might show up, bent on killing him and destroying everything he knows and loves. And counting on someone else to bail him out might not always be a solution.
I would call Goku a bad parent if he didn't ever train Gohan, not for training him.
All of that is romanticizing Child Soldiers. Because people who employ Child Soldiers would say everything you just said. "We live in life or death situations. Dangerous enemies could show up out of nowhere at any moment! It would be criminally negligent to NOT put guns in the hands of 11-year-olds and teach them how to kill our enemies."
edited 30th Aug '16 10:37:06 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Wow, it's like talking with a broken record.
Also, you are wrong. It's more like teaching a kid how to deal with dangerous animals if you happen to live somewhere where they are a problem. Sure you can cover your ears and god "lala no point in teaching my kid that, this won't ever be a problem!" or you can do something to preapare them for it.
Or since you like war analogies so much, imagine living in a war torn, lawless country, where law enforcement is nonexistent and dangerous people might show up any day. It would be pretty stupid to say "Well, kids shouldn't have to deal with things like this, so I won't teach my kid how to deal with it!".
Even in those scenarios, you teach the kid so he'll be ready when he's older. You don't put the gun in the kid's hands when he's 11 and shove him out the door to kill enemies for you.
Your analogy would only be accurate if Goku, Piccolo, etc. weren't sending Gohan into live combat scenarios against ruthless murderers until he came of age. If they were training him but handling the fighting themselves. Which the ICC defines as 15, bare minimum.
Nobody's complaining about Gohan being trained. Combat training for children happens everywhere. You can sign kids up for martial arts classes at very young ages. But any parent who proceeds to set up their orange-belt kid for death matches against experienced adult MMA fighters would be placed under arrest and have their child taken away immediately.
Which, again, is why Chi-Chi's complaint about her 11-year-old son being sent off to die in wars on alien planets and brutal battles against murderbots is entirely valid.
edited 30th Aug '16 11:05:25 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Funny thing is, threats of their world (or ours) don't care about age. Yeah, it would have been much better if Gohan never actually had to fight and the adults could handle things by themselves, but that was never the situation when he was involved, especially not with Cell.
No one is saying this is good, or that that the situations couldn't have been handled better, but this instance that Gohan is a child, and thus no matter how powerful he is should be kept out of things, is ridiculous for the story.
No, what is ridiculous is that the story was written in such a fashion as to assert that putting guns in the hands of children and sending them into war is a heroic and noble deed. That the ends justify the means, that as long as you win the battle, Child Soldiers are an acceptable moral compromise and, if anything, it would be wrong NOT TO send kids into deadly battles.
TFS is calling that out through Chi-Chi. That's been at the heart of their Gohan for a long time now: that Gohan's childhood is utterly f*cked up, and nothing that's been done to him is acceptable.
edited 30th Aug '16 11:07:51 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub....Yeah, I don't really know what we're doing here anymore. At this point I'd have to say you've put more thought, and read more into his own work than Toriyama ever did. You've taken off with this Child Soldiers bit and have ran it into the ground now.
edited 30th Aug '16 11:12:04 AM by LSBK
Welcome to TV Tropes. Well, that's one of the main draws isn't it?
Well, yeah. Toriyama wrote by the seat of his pants. He planned very little and just did things 'cause they seemed cool at the time. I'm sure he had no intention of writing a story that romanticizes Child Soldiers.
But those are the kinds of things that happen sometimes. One of the benefits of adapting a work is that we can look at it and go, "Wow, that part is kinda awful. We should probably fix it or, at least, maybe have a discussion about it. If anything, we can at least point out that it's maybe uncool that the heroes are doing that?"
edited 30th Aug '16 11:16:58 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.If only some other Tropers I know were here, they'd be in strict opposition of of Tobias's argument, simply because of the utter refusal to read subtext.
You run into a bit of a Space Whale Aesop here. Strictly speaking, a child was sent out as the only hope against a world-ending threat. From a strictly rational perspective, that makes sense.
Now, less strictly, more abstractly, less rational and more, er... intuitively?, is Cell some kinda working allegory (not by design, but by result), for the kind of threats that some would use to train up young children into killers?

How did it celebrate Goku for it? Nothing went at all like he thought it would and he died.
edited 30th Aug '16 9:25:15 AM by LSBK