Nen requires trauma—not metaphorical struggle, but actual, documented psychological rupture.

Gon's awakening demands he watch Kite die, be unable to save him, and shatter something inside himself that never fully repairs.

This is not how power systems typically work in shonen anime. Most series treat ability as birthright, training, or luck—something distributed without prerequisite trauma.

You must be damaged to be trustworthy with power.

Look at the York Shin arc. Nobunaga, Feitan, and Phinks—Phantom Troupe members with devastating Nen abilities—are all demonstrably products of exploitation and violence. Their power isn't despite their suffering; it's because of it.

Japan's 1990s economic collapse coincided with the meritocratic dream—education supposedly open, class supposedly mobile. Hunter x Hunter suggests this was always the terror beneath. If the system genuinely opened, unbroken people would gain power, and they'd be dangerous to stability itself.