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LH: You’ll have to excuse my partner. As administrators for and co-creators of the pokémon storage system, we both get this question a lot. Below is the standard response Bill typically offers … when he’s not exasperated, anyway:

Q. Are poké balls ethical?

A. Yes. Given that pokémon typically give their consent through battle before capture—as the poké ball’s safety mechanism will engage and release a pokémon that isn’t willing to be caught, and the act of battling is our way of gaining a baseline level of respect with a wild pokémon—it’s quite impossible to force a pokémon to join one’s team.

Furthermore, continued use of a poké ball is oftentimes necessary. Within its ball, a pokémon enters a semi-suspended state: they don’t need food, water, space, sleep, or thorough enrichment, and their health is by and large preserved in the same state it had been shortly before entering its ball, with the exception of poisoning, which continues to leech health from a pokémon’s data state and should thus be treated. In other words, a poké ball allows for not only compact travel but also the utmost safety, as once recalled, a pokémon is sheltered from the hazards of the outside world. Trainers often use this feature to draw their partners out of dangerous situations—or, at least, they’re encouraged to do so. Likewise, the recall feature allows trainers to withdraw their pokémon if said pokémon themselves present dangerous situations, such as in this case of rampaging pokémon, fire-types in flammable environments, and so forth.

As with all technology, there are unethical ways to use poké balls, and I can’t rightly claim that no one has ever figured out what those ways are. However, the technology itself is not only safe but also improves the lives of both trainers and their pokémon by offering portable shelter and easy transportation for each of a trainer’s team members. The fact that the poké ball also serves as concrete proof of a bond between trainer and pokémon is just an added bonus.