Oh, I don’t think Gon is a monster at all! I didn’t know the fandom really thought that–if they do they can fight me 😛 I think he’s a sweet child who has serious flaws and you can directly trace a lot of those flaws back to his father’s abandonment. Throughout each and every arc, you can see how Gon’s trauma over being abandoned is building and building and building until it eventually explodes in the Chimera Ant Arc, which is where his coping mechanisms fail him completely. 

In the Hunter Exam Arc, we are introduced to Gon as a 12 year old kid who abandons his aunt, the one he considers his mother, to run off and take a deadly exam to find his dad. 

Repeatedly Gon is noted to be reminiscent of Ging in this arc, and we’re supposed to see that not just in terms of “what a great hunter you’ll be!” like it appears to be on the surface, but also… uh oh Gon, be careful that this tendency of yours doesn’t turn into your father’s path, or Hisoka’s. 

Because he’s copying his father’s actions by leaving a loved one for adventure, and following his father’s path is exactly what Gon veers on the edge of throughout HxH. 

However, of course, there are major differences: Gon is a kid. Ging is an adult. Leaving a parent is fundamentally different from leaving a child. If you make the choice to bring a child into this world, you are responsible for them. A child isn’t responsible for their parent; that being said, Gon doesn’t think a whole lot about Mito’s feelings, or give anyone who dies in the Hunter Exam much thought. 

And why would he? He knows people leave. All the time. He sees Ging as sort of this infallible controller of his world, as an idol who set up this hunt for Gon’s own good, and rationalizes that if he left him, it’s okay. 

He’s idolizing the father he doesn’t know, trusting him that no matter what happens, what horrors befall contestants in the Hunter Exam, it’s all worth it because his father’s worth it, because he himself is worth it and if his father abandoned him because he just didn’t care enough then that sense of worth would collapse (Gon has very little sense of self-worth thanks to being abandoned, btw.)  

In the Heaven’s Arena Arc, Gon rushes into facing Hisoka before he is truly ready, something that Hisoka notes and Wing as well. 

And so he loses his fight with Hisoka. But Gon is desperate to achieve all he can so he can find his father, and that’s why he rushes into facing Hisoka. He’s been waiting like what, twelve, thirteen years to meet his dad, of course he doesn’t want to be patient about learning nen. 

In Yorknew, Gon famously asks the Phantom Troupe how they can kill people who have no ties to them, who never did anything to them. 

And like… Gon, your best friend literally has been doing that in front of you even if he’s quit the assassin business. But again. Gon is a child. It all ties into Gon’s desperate need to see a purpose in everything (if he lost this and never grew up, he’d be Hisoka), meaning with a purpose because he sees everything that happens to him post exam as something Ging had orchestrated, and this is the first time the narrative directly forces Gon to see that not everything has a deeper personal meaning to it. Sometimes people hurt people for no reason, or for superficial reasons. 

Greed Island, while it’s by far my least favorite arc, sets up this desperate belief of Gon’s really, really, really well. 

He believes he needs to beat the game honorably, as Ging would want him to. He won’t take the easy way out even when it means breaking his body and Killua’s while facing Razor in the dodgeball game. 

Because he is dependent on Ging’s approval and because he thinks everything has meaning when it comes to Ging. Except Ging actually just doesn’t give a shit. 

But Ging literally sends him to Kite instead of to himself based on a whim, on which card Ging picks, on whether he’s traveling alone or not. It’s literally pointless of Ging to do this, but he does. And because of this Gon winds up attaching himself to Kite as a father figure and sinking deeper into his desperate beliefs that everything has meaning and will be okay because Kite (whom he sees as an extension of Ging) is in control. “Kite wouldn’t let that thing beat him!” he tells Killua of Pitou. 

And during his confrontation with Pitou, Gon’s screaming at them that he “can’t wait anymore!” 

Gon is not talking about just fighting Pitou/getting Kite back. He’s talking about Ging. 

And he loses himself, literally growing up way too fast and almost dying because of it. 

It’s therefore fitting that he finally meets Ging after Killua gets Nanika to save him, right as Ging’s about to explore the Dark Continent. The world is opening up–it’s not contained anymore. And Gon’s world is opening up. It’s not limited to Ging’s orchestrations anymore, but rather Gon is now free to explore his own path.