This panel always amazed me because of the astute self awareness Gaara possesses, even at a young age, and yet unfortunately for him it shares the same coin as self consciousness which in Gaara's case completely obliterates his self esteem and confused the whole plot of who's fault Gaara's upbring is.
I get the impression that Gaara is aware what caused his "emotional issues" as he cites them while talking to Shikamaru and Naruto - he 'killed' his mother, his father tried to kill him, he was born through ninjutsu, he grew up alone - yet the overall impression is that he doesn't fully understand that his issues are not due to anything he did.
Everything Gaara does goes on to validate himself because of his low opinion of himself; he considers himself a failed experiment and something that people wish would disappear, he becomes insecure in the presence of those powerful and 'like' him, be is extremely sensitive to how people perceive him and how they look at him. He believes that in order to validate himself he has to kill others, but that idea never originated from him, rather it was instilled in him twice: once from the circumstances of his birth (he is a weapon) and a second time from Yashamaru. The idea of killing everyone was NOT his idea. I repeat, it was NOT his idea! Yet because Gaara is deeply, deeply insecure he operates under the belief HE is defective, so he abandons actual normal relationship building behaviours (like bringing that young girl medicine) in order to engage with the traumatic ways to validate himself which he's been taught over and over.
Gaara might know why he's broken, but because be blames himself for it at his core we're able to see he demonstrates the redeemable quality of empathy. Look at how he talks about his village, he almost empathizes with them. It's not their fault he has "emotional issues" they just don't understand because they're "fools." He just has mental instability which -opps! - now those poor fools have to deal with it. It's all my fault, he thinks.
He doesn't seem to fully appreciate that he's not the guilty one. Everything - absolutely everything - is everyone else's fault but the abuse Gaara endured was so deep he was brainwashed to criticize himself. After all, be failed his initial purpose for existing, which was to be the ultimate weapon of the sand, which is also deeply abusive!!! Get someone to list ANY reason they might want kids and saying "I want to turn them into a military tool" is among one of the WORST.
Though Gaara -somehow- doesn't see it that way. Instead he's always looking out a window into the outside world, understanding so intimately that he is not normal that he never once questioned whether or not the outside world was "normal."
Again, Gaara is smart, he seems to understand to some level that he didn't grow up properly, but there's a fundamental lack of "getting it." It's like watching someone read from a book but if you ask them what it means they don't know, because the book introduces ideas and topics that don't "apply" to them. Sure, Gaara is aware certain concepts exist; he sees love and friendship and he yearns for them, but he has convinced himself (as a result of his abuse) that these concepts do not apply to him, that he is different because he is "defective."
Gaara, you don't blame a seed for not germinating and growing into a plant. You blame the environment. Blame the environment! From what I can tell, even when he was a "psychopath" (I disagree with calling him that) he always seemed deeply deeply aware of other people's thoughts and feelings, and because the opinions of others were profoundly negative, it furthered his hatred for himself.
Which I have the opinion that Gaara, even if treated kindly, would never make the perfect weapon for the sand. It's not even because of the physical complications that come with having Shukaku but because of how deeply loving and kind Gaara genuinely is. Gaara was doomed to being a defective jinchuriki because his greatest weapon had always been his empathy and, ironically enough, it is just not in him to kill people.
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