Saturday, January 3, 2004

   Pure Genius...

I feel that it is my duty to re-print this rant of Devidramon's(he's on the boards) on the evils of Pokemon versus the goodness of digimon. I know that it's long, but it's just great. "Something about Pokemon trainers: Ash and company shouldn't be compared to Takato, but to Ken back in his Kaiser/Emperor days. Think of it. A Pokemon is sitting there minding is own business. Say a Pidgeot is looking for a nice, juicy Caterpie to feed to her hatchlings. Then, she hears something in the bushes. It's a human. Of course, she doesn't know that. To her, it's just another Pokemon. It's neither predator nor prey, and therefore irrelevant. Back to searching for food. Or so she thinks. The creature takes out a red-and-white sphere, and tosses it on the ground. And suddenly, in a flash of red light, in the place of a sphere stands a Pokemon. Maybe it's the firey dragon Charizard, or the powerful Rhydon, a rhino made of solid granite. Maybe the telepathic, telekinetic Alakazam. Maybe the deceptively small, cute Pikachu. The human gives the word, and the new Pokemon proceeds to beat the Pidgeot to within an inch of her life. The assailant will crush, shock, or burn the Pidgeot, until she is so weak, or injured, or simply in too much agony to move, and is lying on the ground, moaning. Once the beating ends, the human gleefully tosses a Pokeball, and the Pidgeot is struck by it, and the bands of red light wrap around it, sealing it in a sphere barely larger than a baseball. It then shrinks from baseball size to marble size to go into the human's pocket (hence Pocket Monsters.) Then, she's enslaved, and endure anything the captor wants. The rest of her life will consist of being caged inside the ball except for the few seconds the trainer lets her out to similarly crush other Pokemon, so that they will share her fate. She doesn't know or care what she's doing, she just does what her trainer tells her to do. Why? For the same reason she does everything, the only reason for which she'll do anything from now on: Her trainer told her to. And what of her children? Since their mother doesn't come back that night, or any night ever again, where does their food come from? Perhaps it doesn't, and they starve to death. Perhaps they are beaten bloody and, when sufficiently pounded, face the Pokeball and their mother's fate. The trainer doesn't stop to think about what he's done. It's just a game to him. Because, as the song said back in the first season, "there are a hundred and fifty or more to see, to be a Pokemon master is my destiny." So he's off to 'catch 'em all,' whistling as he enjoys the sound of Pidgeys singing. Little does he know why they're "singing:" They're calling for their mother, who left and never returned. And never will. And if a Pokemon doesn't have any children, friends, or family (extremely unlikely) and the trainer is very nice, still, that doesn't change the score: he/she/it was most likely obtained in the same manner, stored in the same cage, and brought out for the same reasons. Brock's cool, but Onix spends his days in the Pokeball, not in the quarry with his brethren. Pidgeotto's story may very well be the one I described above. Ash sure didn't stop to find out. Nope, he's on his great Pokemon Journey, off to the next adventure! The only person in Digimon to do that was the Digimon Emperor. Early in the season we see him on what he called a 'hunting expedition' and Ash calls a Pokemon journey. He tossed Dark Rings onto a couple of Gotsumon, and made them fight each other in the arena. The arena was one of his favorite forms of entertainment. Though he talks more nicely, Ash has Pokemon attack other Pokemon so he can capture them and make them fight. Yet Ash is considered the hero of Pokemon, while Ken was the sick, sadistic Digimon Emperor who makes a game of the suffering of others. What's the difference? Inquiring minds want to know. So far, the difference I see is this: Ken was actually under the influence of the Dark Spore he got from his encounter with Millenniumon in the game. So the evil, sadistic Digimon Emperor was more Millenniumon than Ken, and when Ken finally overcame it, he practically went insane at the realization of what he's done and is still pretty fragile. His every action since making that realization has been to atone for his crimes. Ash, on the other hand, is doing it all under his own free will and it's still a game to him. Ken thought Digimon was all data in a computer, not actually alive, more like the most interactive video game ever. Simply realizing that Digimon were alive after all made him snap out of it. Ash knows full well that Pokemon are alive. Hasn't stopped him yet." While I remember to tell you, if you guys want me to bring back my Pearls Of Wisdom(for examples, check my Archives), just leave a comment on this post. If enough people want it, back it goes! Kira signing off.

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