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DISCUSSION: The Ethics of Pokémon Battles

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So this is a topic that came up in the #writing channel of Bulbagarden's Discord - is battling pokémon really ethical?

It's a relatively common theme among dramatic or dark fanfiction, that pokémon battling is humans forcing pokémon into what amounts to a blood sport. A common comment within that is that pokémon are sentient creatures with thoughts and feelings of their own. Common counter-arguments hold that pokémon don't mind, if not actively enjoy battling.

Some points of discussion you might like to consider:
  • What does sentience mean? Is it the same as sapience?
  • How does the game canon differ from the anime canon, or the manga?
  • How does a non-human psychology change the debate?
  • How do we incorporate these ideas into our stories?
However, some ground rules: Questions of ethics and animal rights can generate passionate debate, so I want to remind everyone to be civil, respect each other's opinions, and remember that this is a hypothetical discussion.
 
I actually do have this as a bit of a historical plot-point within my own story.

I think it's also important to answer it in the basis of "how does this fit within the setting of my story?" In my case, mine is more "real world with Pokemon added in," so I had to answer a lot of questions: Is the League a sport? How is it organized? Why would abuse be allowed? What kind of societal situation would exist for abuse to be possible? How closely monitored are Trainers?

The result... The League I ended up with is kinda terrifying, if you really think about it, and you get an idea of why it is there were a lot of necessary reforms and why it went from "sending 11-year-olds into the wilderness" to "sending trained 18-year-olds on guided paths."
 
The way I see it, the Pokémon League obviously regulates what moves are considered safe and fair to use in battle. This may seem insignificant at first, but then one must recall the number of moves introduced in other media (particularly the TCG) that have never gone on to appear in the core games. My theory is, it isn't that those moves are non-canon; for one reason or another, they're illegal for use in matches conducted under League rules.

From there, it's easy to imagine how tightly the League must regulate other aspects of battle, as well—the turn-based structure, the four-move limit, and so on. It is possible to battle in a much more dynamic and brutal manner; the League simply doesn't allow it.

Okay, so why do wild Pokémon conform to these rules?

According to Sinnoh mythology, humans and Pokémon have lived in harmony since time immemorial. When a wild Pokémon appears from the tall grass (or wherever such an encounter is possible), it isn't a malicious attack—they're coming to offer their help. They only attack when the human sends out his or her own Pokémon, at which point the encounter most likely becomes a kind of game or test. This is also why freshly-caught Pokémon immediately obey the player's orders without question. (Traded Pokémon, meanwhile, may disobey because they have not personally tested their new trainer, and must be won over with proof of competence such as gym badges.)

This is further supported by the Safari Zone, where the player never sends out a Pokémon. No wild Pokémon encountered here ever attack the human trainer directly, even when threatened with crude weaponry such as rocks.

What I take away from this is that Pokémon almost never seem to battle with serious intent to harm. It's a game to them, and they value fairness and safety. In all likelihood, it is their preferences that formed the basis of the Pokémon League's rules and regulations, not the other way around.

While examples do exist of regular Pokémon following orders that could result in serious harm—as Jessie's Ekans strongly implies in EP017 "Island of the Giant Pokémon", Pokémon in the service of bad people may do this blindly without regard for the implications—this is less common than one might expect, hence the need for the various crime syndicates to fight by the rules. This helps explain Cipher's actions—they develop technology that allows them to bypass the generally-good nature of Pokémon and turn them into ruthless, savage beasts, because they simply wouldn't battle with killer intent otherwise. (Interestingly, this also results in said Pokémon gaining the ability to use nonstandard moves that are super effective against everything and have never appeared in the core series. The implication, again, is not that said moves are non-canon; only that they are illegal.)

TL;DR The rules and regulations of Pokémon combat are most likely the invention of Pokémon themselves, which have since been adopted and refined by the Pokémon League.
 
I think the sentience question is interesting and, in short, I would have to say, "Yes, I think Pokémon are sentient." My opinion is based mainly on communication and structural society. In the wild, a lot of Pokémon build communities that consist of multiple species of Pokémon who work together, not just a single species fighting for survival against all the others. The communication, however, I think is key. It has been proven, in the Anime, that Pokémon can learn to speak the human tongue (Meowth and Slowking come to mind), while it is obvious that practically all Pokémon understand human speech. In addition, Pokémon can speak to one another. This wouldn't be as significant if they could only speak to Pokémon of their own species, yet (despite all sounding different), Pokémon can speak to all other species as well. The Anime makes it pretty obvious that it isn't just responding to gestures and tones either, Pokémon understand words and their meaning.

The battling thing, I have never had an ethical problem with, nor with the league. It is, in essence, a combat sport. It is not different than boxing or MMA for humans (though people may raise ethical questions there as well). People train themselves on a daily basis to compete on a high level in sports, some even with trainers. It rings the same with Pokémon. Battling is their sport, the trainer is their coach. I suppose they have a little less say in the matter because they are caught by the trainer and they don't decide one day, "Hey, I want to be a battling Pokémon, let's go find me a trainer," but...maybe they do. There are plenty of wild, unexplored environments in the Pokémon World (the mountains north of Kanto come to mind), yet Pokémon live in and around humans anyway. Maybe these are the Pokémon that WANT to be caught and WANT to battle. Just a thought.
-Another random thought on the battling front, though it is contradicted between the Anime and the Video Games, is how dangerous Pokémon truly are. Ash is constantly getting burned (by Charizard, I never made it out of Kanto with the Anime) and electrocuted by Pikachu, yet only is temporarily harmed. Jessie and James are blown up and beaten to a pulp. Still kicking. Perhaps, Pokémon attacks are not as brutal as they appear (or the tv characters are all related to Superman).
--This is obviously contradicted by certain Pokédex entries, like "Its body temperature is roughly 18,000 degrees F." (Magcargo, if you didn't know).

What bothers me the most (ethically) about Pokémon is that, apparently, we eat some of them. Although the Anime and the Video Games try to avoid directly saying it (I do the same in my stories) by having Pokémon eat dogfood-like meals and people eat berries, ect, while the only Pokémon inspired dish in the Gen VI restaurants were (ironically), Slowpoke Tails, if people in the Pokémon World eat meat...WHERE DOES IT COME FROM??? Pokémon are the animals of the world, I don't see cows (other than Miltank) running around, Magikarp may be common, but they are still Pokémon, not a common perch to be caught and fried. So, if everyone in the Pokémon World vegetarian, including the Pokémon (because, what do they eat in the wild, I can't see a Tyranitar pulling berries off a tree), or do we slaughter Pokémon to eat? That bothers me a bit.
 
One easy way I have of handling the question of how Pokemon interact with the diet is to treat it as a general classification, much like "mammals" is a general classification.

Thus, the types, like psychic and ghost, are divisions within the Pokemon classification that categorize Pokemon by shared characteristics. Thus, psychic types would be closer to human-level intelligence, due in part to their more mental focus, while normal types would be around animal-level intelligence (notice how many of them are, in appearance, common animals).

Thus, humans end up eating the normal, grass, flying, and water types with the exception of any that are also steel, poison, psychic, ghost, or fairy. Also, not eating normal types that are typically pets, like Meowths.
 
One easy way I have of handling the question of how Pokemon interact with the diet is to treat it as a general classification, much like "mammals" is a general classification.

Thus, the types, like psychic and ghost, are divisions within the Pokemon classification that categorize Pokemon by shared characteristics. Thus, psychic types would be closer to human-level intelligence, due in part to their more mental focus, while normal types would be around animal-level intelligence (notice how many of them are, in appearance, common animals).

Thus, humans end up eating the normal, grass, flying, and water types with the exception of any that are also steel, poison, psychic, ghost, or fairy. Also, not eating normal types that are typically pets, like Meowths.

That does make a lot of sense. Some Pokémon would be more advanced (perhaps thats where additional typing comes from) and less suitable for food.
 
Personally, I find that it's far more logical that it's both. It's all about how far you go. The pokemon league is a highly regulated safe sport similar to boxing or MMA. Meanwhile I'm certain there are brutal underground rings that make it a bloodsport. Battling itself is something pokemon enjoy, at least in general. What pokemon really enjoy is the work their trainer does to help them be better. Based on what the pokemon wants the battling is more or less helpful. If nothing else it's a good confidence boost and physical ability training.

Moving outside of the sporting aspect. I think pokemon battling is a sort of necessity in the world because people can't compete with dangerous wild pokemon on their own. They need to bond with and train pokemon to stand a chance against the more monstrous of species.
 
I think there's an important point to bring up in regards to how pokémon get injured, that often gets missed. Pokémon can routinely take a lot more punishment than a human can, and recover just fine. This is carried through more than just the game canon, so it's not just a game mechanic (Though I think you could call it a narrative convenience). That being the case, you can also argue that to a pokémon, being knocked unconscious isn't necessarily more concerning than, say, leaving a sparring session full of bruises would be to a human. So that being the case there's an argument for saying that pokémon battles can be seen as analogous to martial arts contests between humans
 
I guess it depends on how you portray it. Like do the moves have the potential to actually kill? Are 'Pokemon able to directly kill someone (like, using flamethrower on someone kills them as opposed to simply toasting them a bit)?
 
My headcanon is that Pokémon hold back in battle, and becoming Shadow Pokémon removes their moral inhibitions. I want to write a fanfic one day that goes into the mind of a Shadow Pokémon.
 
Sentient means the ability to perceive and react to the world.

Sapient means that the creature can not only understand the world around itself, but it can understand abstract concepts. Basically, it's on the level of a Human.

I see most fighting, psychic and pretty much all Legendaries as sapient. The others, I determine sentience and sapience by species. So there can be both be a sapient poison-type and a sentient poison type. Eating sentient pokémon may be frowned upon depending on the species but eating sapient pokémon would be viewed as being akin to cannibalism.

As for the ethics of pokémon battling, I think some pokémon (wild and trained alike) actually enjoy it. And the trainers obviously try to capture the ones who do enjoy it. And of course, there are rules to prevent excessive violence and bloodshed.

As for people saying it's like MMA, I'd say pokémon battling is more akin to this:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=105&v=gVTr9GU7rsU
 
I think part of what informs the morality of pokemon battles within my writing is that I have pokemon as not only capable of killing humans, but actively used for warfare. And that's not counting the species created specifically for warfare (Genesect and Mewtwo), or the ones with specially-engineered variants for war (Metagross, Gardevoir, Machamp, Raichu, and a few dozen others have war variants). Or the Pokemon that have been used as cannon ammunition in the past (Electrode, Geodude). And that's not counting the other creative ways humans have come up with for using pokemon lethally, such as using a dozen Magnemites and a human telekinetic for an improvised railgun.

Ever wonder why the League imposes the six pokemon limit? It's the railgun trick. To a degree, the League is forced to work to minimize the collateral damage Trainers are capable of.

But, then, the setting also has humans armed, and includes human weapons created with killing pokemon in mind. Given humanity's history of warfare, such is kinda inevitable.

So, this probably gives some horrifying insight as to how pokemon like Honedge exist in that world and exactly what mindset would lead to the amount of spite or pure rage that allows the pokemon to exist in the first place.
 
@Ereshkigal, your story sounds interesting and is reminiscent of Poké Wars.

But I think the ethics of battling could be seen as dependent on setting.

Like in Poké Wars where having a "friendly Pokémon battle" will get you the same look as if you proposed "having a friendly shootout", the ethics of battling are "don't kill someone who doesn't deserve it".

In other, lighter stories, the ethics of battling maybe more along the lines of "don't force pokémon into battling if they don't want to battle", "play fair", "no gratuitous violence".
 
Well, with their setting, something else that informs the morality is that pokemon combats started out as an organized sport. It wasn't supposed to be any more dangerous than American Football or boxing.

In the span of events from 1996 to 2013, it transformed into the current pseudo-military, Trainers-as-special-forces-but-we're-still-a-sport mess it currently is. Needless to say, they're not handing pokemon to eleven-year-olds and pointing them at the wilderness anymore.
 
Nicely presented, @Beth Pavell.

Firstly, I want to establish firmly that sentience is simply being a living thing that can perceive and feel. Pokémon are sentient. Sapience is the ability to discern, to have abstract thoughts, to make judgements, and to reason. Some or all pokémon might be sapient, or they might not.

Now, this is a substantial topic, since it's the greatest controversy associated with the franchise, and probably the most "legitimate" or reasonable concern. I'm just going to give it a quick dusting, if I can manage to contain myself.

Firstly, what would make pokémon battling unethical? Real cock or dog fighting and other bloodsports require the physically harmful exploitation of animals for our own entertainment, animals who would never otherwise engage in this kind of fight, animals who we subdue, imprison and control. Fighting animals are abused, terrified, and forced to fight. They don't give consent, the experience is traumatic and dangerous for them, and the whole point is for humans to watch bloody brutality.

Does that sound like pokémon battling? It doesn't to me.

Pokémon are natural battlers,
to the point that many of them are suggested to have taught martial arts to humans and not the other way around. They enjoy fighting for fun, and grow from it. They literally physically mature from exposure to friendly combat. They are sometimes poached, caged and trafficked, certainly. However, pokémon trainers are generally shown to ask pokémon for their willing partnership, and only villainous characters exploit pokémon selfishly. Pokémon might dish out what seems like tremendous damage, but they are rarely seriously harmed in ordinary training or battles, and often come around from unconsciousness in minutes or even seconds hardly the worse for wear. These are not animals, but extraordinary, intelligent creatures with supernatural superpowers. They can and do refuse to battle when it suits them, and can and do easily hand out thrashings to malevolent humans. What's more, the purpose of pokémon battles is mutual growth, in which trainers are both coaches and companions to the participants. Spectators are here to see sportsmanship, not blood.

As for why people have the impression that pokémon glorifies bloodsport, I'm really not sure. Intellectual dishonesty and spurious speculation on the part of moralistic parents and teachers, perhaps? Crazed evangelists and alarmist news reporters? PETA being PETA, and therefore disgustingly manipulative? Edgy fanficcers who prefer a setting full of suffering, no matter how contrived? I don't know, but I've not heard a compelling, rational argument yet.

The franchise does not depict, let alone glorify bloodsport. Battles aren't lethal, they're hardly even injurious. Lasting damage is almost unheard of. Pokémon are routinely asked for their consent to join a trainer journey and allowed to leave without restriction or coercion. Hell, Ash falls over himself to release his pokémon when they have a personal desire other than being on his team. Ash's first significant act as a character is to put himself physically between pikachu and harm a billion furious birds, and he and other characters often dive to catch their pokémon from long drops, and are highly protective of their charges. When trainers or pokémon go too far, other characters will be shocked and often intervene. A distinction is sometimes made between battles, with their rules and regulations, and actually fighting, which is considered aberrant. This is a franchise fixated on mutual cooperation, friendship, and compassion. I don't think it's at all fair to interpret it as a shiny veneer over secret awfulness.

Plus, you know. Battles are constantly compared to martial arts by all the literal martial artists in the franchise. They're like MMA or American wrestling. Obviously.

So, does that mean pokémon battling is ethical? Maybe. Ethics are complicated enough just dealing with simple, everyday decisions. But there's certainly a strong case for them being ethical, considering all the above. When you get down to it, battles don't seem harmful. They seem like a good thing.

Thanks for reading.

Addendum: Detective Pikachu spoilers: Ryme City's underground arena battles sure seem like unregulated bloodsporty pitfights, but even then it seemed like that blastoise and gengar were doing an MMA/wrestling type of thing, and not going for the throat. Shirtless dude was absolutely pissed that his charizard was scarred by a previous fight, and it took the release of R-gas to make a pokémon genuinely vicious. Plus Tim was absolutely outclassed by that cubone at the start who didn't want to be his partner. I reckon the film supports my interpretations.
 
@unrepentantAuthor Don't forget that some of the Pokémon in that scene were cheering too.

Speaking of Detective Pikachu, Tamashii Hiroka recently made a video where she calls Pokémon an "inherently problematic concept" and questions their role in Ryme City. It's not as hate-filled as I made it sound. One of the comments also interested me:
When it comes to non-battling society as you also touched on, the weird aspect is that Pokémon aren’t strongly defined as either animals or higher beings. As you said, several can talk, Alakazam supposedly is a super genius, Lapras and Chansey are implied to be incredibly empathetic, many of the legendaries supposedly control the balance of the universe, etc. Are Pokémon intended as spiritual beings? Animals? Aliens? Non-human but sentient life? All of the above? We don’t know what Pokémon want out of life, what they care about, what they strive for. If Alakazam is really so smart it’s hard to believe that anyone that bright would be content to just sit in a ball most of the time aside from battling. But for something like Chansey or Audino, it probably does enjoy working alongside doctors and nurses.

I'd also like to bring up Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, where Pokémon only fight out of self-defence, and people say it's better than the main series because it doesn't have the ethical questions. What would these Pokémon think of battles-as-a-sport?
 
I hadn't noticed the cheering pokémon, good catch.

The issue of pokémon motivation and what they're defined as is a whole thing on its own, not helped by inconsistencies in the franchise. Also, I wish people wouldn't get hung up on ridiculous stuff like "alakazam has an IQ of 9000" which is impossible since that's not how IQ works or what it's for.

As for PMD, pokémon absolutely fight for reasons other than self defence. That's why they have to defend themselves.
 
The Pokédex throws out a lot of big numbers. Everyone talks about Magcargo being hotter than the sun, but I've only ever seen TheJWittz mention that according to the Pokédex, Slurpuff's sense of smell is a million times better than a human's.

For a while I've had an idea for a PMD-ish setting where battles are a spectator sport, and the fighters are basically celebrities. Hire me, Spike Chunsoft.
 
It's a relevant point, at least, that pokémon motivations are only really explored in the anime, and then it's almost always about how pokémon love battling. Whether trends differ between species seems a topic for fanfic. I say trends quite deliberately, because anyone who's owned a pet knows that animals have personalities of their own.

As a less relevant aside, the only evidence for Alakazam's intelligence comes from that silly figure - putting that aside, who's to say that even means anything? I say the same body of evidence also tells us that Alakazam are neither especially creative nor sociable
 
I still remember when Official Nintendo Magazine joked that "Pokémon, like Klingons, are naturally inclined towards violence", and the time I brought it up on the clichés thread.

In all seriousness, is it just me, or did Pokémon seem more mysterious and less understood in Gen 1?
 
Please note: The thread is from 5 years ago.
Please take the age of this thread into consideration in writing your reply. Depending on what exactly you wanted to say, you may want to consider if it would be better to post a new thread instead.
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