Sharks!
Posted on July 30th, 2007 in Uncategorized | 19 Comments »
It’s Shark Week on the Discovery Channel! Watch itâbut bear in mind that Discovery hypes the scariness of sharks in a way that doesn’t necessarily do them much good.
With that in mind, the Save Our Seas foundation has a great new ad calling for folks to “rethink the shark.” Take a look.
Meanwhile, in Martha’s Vineyard, the annual slaughterfest known as the “Monster Shark Tournament” was won by charter-boat captain Bob DeCosta, who landed a 327-pound thresher shark.
DeCosta said the tournament protesters were only a minor distraction and they didnât understand that in the grand scheme of things, the 20 or so sharks pulled from the water are a drop in the bucket compared to commercial shark fishing, where only the fins of sharks are sought for shark-fin soup. These commercial fishermen cut off the fins and throw the sharks, still alive, back into the water.
True enough, but DeCosta’s logic isn’t compelling. That’s sort of like saying that it’s okay to shoot an elephant because it’s the poachers who do most of the damage. Well, no.
The thresher shark, by the way, is endangered. It’s also a truly beautiful animal. Here’s what it looks like alive…
And here’s what it looks like dead….
(Why, I can not help but wonder, do these New Jersey fishermen seem to think that they’ve done something to be proud of?)
I know some of you readers of this blog summer on the Vineyard. How about a letter to the local paper?
19 Responses
7/30/2007 8:57 am
This shark took too many bytes…
7/30/2007 10:22 am
Margaret Soltan revisits the 2001 flap over Harvard’s endowment:
http://margaretsoltan.phenominet.com/2007/07/return-with-ud-to-fair-harvard-days-of.html
7/30/2007 12:20 pm
Live from Camp David-doesn’t Gordon Brown sound like a Prime Minister and W sounds like he is running for student council….by the way, the shark in the picture is stunning but not as much as the stark contrast in the British approach to communicating and the current inhabitant of 1600 Penn Ave approach.
7/30/2007 2:01 pm
Shark, shark, shark on a lark, lark, lark.
7/30/2007 2:35 pm
There’s an interesting line in the article about the winning boat captain. Apparently, when they got the Thresher onboard, they thought it was dead, but the fish suddenly came to life and started….thrashing. “[So] the crew got the fish back in the water with a line attached to the tail and dragged it backward to kill it before bringing it back up on the boat to head back to the harbor.”
Dragged it backwards? Exactly how did that kill it? Drowning by forcing water into the gills? Any of you sportfishermen out there happen to know how death is actually accomplished in this manner?
7/30/2007 3:21 pm
Well I don’t know about killing fish this way but if you ever get caught surrounded by sharks on your boat, throw it in reverse and you’ll soon be rid of them-they cannot swim backwards.
As for other methods…well Milo Minderbinder has some thoughts on that and medals, too.
7/30/2007 3:51 pm
Take your medication please.
7/30/2007 4:04 pm
ever been on a boat surrounded by sharks…so speak for yourself wise guy.
7/30/2007 4:07 pm
3:21 Is right vicious but not versatile. Sorta like a lot of the bloggers in this fishbowl.
7/30/2007 4:58 pm
4:04 - no, i’ve never been on a boat surrounded by sharks, but i’ve been in the water WITH sharks and i can attest that, while they probably (?) can’t swim backwards, they turn around very quickly, kind of like fighter jets, so i doubt backing up is a terribly viable escape plan. you’ve talked yourself into a catch 22 i’m afraid.
7/30/2007 5:03 pm
nope-been there done that in the south seas……..your move
7/30/2007 6:16 pm
well i’m glad you escaped, otherwise we wouldn’t have had the benefit of so ridiculous a discussion.
7/31/2007 8:00 am
Is it ridiculous because you participated or because you have no first hand experience to share?
Mind your manners, sir.
7/31/2007 11:00 am
its ridiculous because sharks can obviously turn around and follow a boat they’ve been circling, no matter what direction its going in, if they want to. the image of someone driving a boat in reverse in the open ocean to escape a swarm of sharks is just kind of ….. funny. makes me wonder if swimming backward will work too.
7/31/2007 11:51 am
can you?
7/31/2007 3:19 pm
no, but i often enjoy having my ankles roped and being dragged along ass backwards by a powerboat until i suffocate.
7/31/2007 10:02 pm
you are so wicked cool
8/1/2024 1:30 pm
no, i’m cris angel, mindfreak!
8/2/2024 12:19 pm
i wasn’t going to post this, but since this thread has already descended into ridiculousness…
from washington wizards point guard gilbert arenas’ blog:
“I know this is random, but I just want to clear this up for people out there.
There are these things called shark attacks, but there is no such thing as a shark attack. I have never seen a real shark attack.
I know you’re making a weird face as you’re reading this. OK people, a shark attack is not what we see on TV and what people portray it as.
We’re humans. We live on land.
Sharks live in water.
So if you’re swimming in the water and a shark bites you, that’s called trespassing. That is called trespassing. That is not a shark attack.
A shark attack is if you’re chilling at home, sitting on your couch, and a shark comes in and bites you; now that’s a shark attack. Now, if you’re chilling in the water, that is called invasion of space. So I have never heard of a shark attack.
When I see on the news where it’s like, “There have been 10 shark attacks,” I’m like, “Hey, for real?! They’re just running around? Sharks are walking now, huh! We live on the land, we don’t live underwater.””