Is it ethical?

[Yellow-kun]

Pokemon Black and White makes us ask a really interesting question, and that is: Is it really ethical to just catch Pokemon and make them do whatever we want?

For the whole franchise, they've made it very clear that Pokemon and Humans are "friends", and that it's all about working together.

But now, 14 years in and we have an "evil" team who makes us question that most basic premise of what we're doing.


Is it ok to forcibly capture Pokemon and bend them to our will?  

[Yilanti Midnight]

If you consider Pokemon animals, the fact that we've banned things like rooster fights and dog fights makes Pokemon a pretty nasty game once you go into it. That's why they have to wrap it with a huge fluffy blanket of FRIENDSHIP and BE NICE, because they'd have so many organisations jumping down their throats if they did.

Unlike animals though, Pokemon can clearly communicate what they want and how they feel. In the anime you often see Ash pretty much asking the Pokemon if they want to join his team first instead of beating them up. However, I can imagine that's a bit difficult to translate to the game.

I can imagine that there are Pokemon who do enjoy fighting and thus want to be caught and trained. And why wouldn't a Pokemon run away from its trainer if it's treated badly?

Team Plasma do raise a good point, but they do go about doing it wrong (beating up Munna?). If I did live in the Pokeworld, I would love to form a Pokemon Rescue Agency. Like there's an Animal Rescue Agency, it's to save Pokemon and punish the humans mistreating them.