Persuasive Essay On Shark

The scene is a familiar one. Peaceful beachgoers splashing around in the water unaware of the monstrous danger that lurks beneath. The suspenseful music reaches a climax and an unfortunate victim is suddenly dragged underwater leaving behind a bloody trail. The summer blockbuster hit, Jaws, sparked a vilification of sharks that has spread throughout the world. Following Jaws, sharks fell victim to the stereotype of the horrendous man-eating creatures which needed to be annihilated. Because of public opinion on sharks, the hunting and finning of sharks has gone unnoticed for years, becoming a significant problem in our oceans. Without a doubt sharks can be ferocious and frightening creatures. Regarded as one of the ocean’s top predators, these

However, no matter how negatively portrayed, sharks mistakenly kill an average of five humans annually compared to 35 humans killed by dogs every year (Mother Nature Network). Statistically, you have a 1 in 84 chance of dying from a car crash compared to the 1 in 3,700,000 chance of being killed from a shark attack (Human Shark Bait). In reality sharks are one of the most misunderstood creatures on the planet. However, humans continue to declare them as murderers. The result is that people are blinded to the atrocities performed on sharks and are less likely to know about the dangers facing sharks today. Within the past fifty years, the slaughter of sharks has risen 400 percent (Sea Shepherd). This translates to an estimated 100 million sharks that are fished per year (Predators as Prey). According to the World Conservation Union’s Red List of Threatened Species,

Therefore, they are slow to mature, taking up to twenty five years to hit sexual maturity and producing only a few offspring. These attributes contribute to making them vulnerable to the massive amount of pressure exerted by commercial fisheries and slow to recover from overfishing. As a result, I propose that we put a complete end to the practice of shark finning at sea and heavily regulate shark hunting. Fishermen would no longer be allowed to cut the fins off and then throw the sharks back into the water. Instead, they would have to bring the entire shark back to port, and utilize the entirety of the body. Only a certain number of sharks could be killed annually and only certain species that are not already facing extinction could be caught. Sharks caught outside the regulations must be released back into the wild immediately. These measures will help insure that our oceans remain healthy by protecting the shark