Saw this photo on another Oregon blog The Doc Is In, and it got me thinking about irrational fear of shark attack. The images scare the eff out of us, and touch a primal place inside it seems. Thus, this means they are good media, good things to flash about to create emotion and sell airtime and movies -- and get blog hits too.
It is this same fear that promotes and supports the wanton killing of these great animals, sadly. Here is a picture editorializing my feelings about this killing (couldn't resist).
What are the real risks though, just to be clear? Here are a few numbers I grabbed from this great ichthyology site from the Florida Museum of Natural History:
Annual Risk Of Death During One's Lifetime
Disease and Accidental Causes of Deaths, # Annual Deaths, Death Risk During One's Lifetime
Heart disease 652,486: 1 in 5
Cancer 553,888: 1 in 7
Stroke 150,074: 1 in 24
Hospital Infections 99,000: 1 in 38
Flu 59,664: 1 in 63
Car accidents 44,757: 1 in 84
Shark attack 1: 1 in 3,748,067
U.S. Annual Average of Animal-Related Fatalities During the 1990s
Deer (Vehicular Collisions) 130
Dogs 18
Snakes 15
Mountain Lions 0.6
Sharks 0.4
Now think about that -- dogs intentionally killed 18 people in this time period, that's pretty creepy in and of itself. It's not at all like the 130 unintentional deer-related fatalities, in my book.
[all above stats Copyright International Shark Attack File]
[original story and photograph credit here]
Enjoy your irrational fears,
Bp
16 comments:
I saw that the other day on The Doc Is In too. I googled around a bit and found that you can buy a poster of that image from Africa Geographic. I ordered one for a kayaking friend who's terrified of sharks ;-)
that photo is incredible. So are the statistics. And yet i still fear the ocean, and all the life forms in it that I can't see but can see me. Not fun. The last 2 times we were in Hawaii they had shut different parts of the beach down to tourists because someone has been bitten or eaten by a shark. So, when you hear about it and it just happened at the beach you are at, it is terrifying. Plus we are part of the Jaws generation. So we can't help it. We were too young to see that movie when we did.
Oh Dave that's cruel LOL. Spectacular image tho, no doubt about it.
C -- you are absolutely right, Jaws and Alien were wayyyyy too young for me, just not right LOL.
http://evernex.com/ljg/flavorsuspect.jpg
OMG that's awesome.
Did you make that?
that is an amazing picture. I love that you found all the stats too. I think there are a lot of unreported killings done by housecats too. they are evil incarnate, just waiting , watching
Oooohhh sharks.
I still freak out a bit when touching lake/sea bottoms that are mushy..
Katye: AMAZING pickles. they were forgotten about in the busyness and were just cracked open today. SO GOOD.
Kate: I can has Kayak burger?
I was so hoping to find stats about housecats killing people. Nothing so far, dammit.
http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=YQdGMs7wSs0
My kitty will sleep you to death.
Your Cute-Fu is strong, young padiwan.
*strikes a pose*
Sharks are nearly all friendly...TRUST ME.
Bentley HAHAHA!
Welcome Sharky, yeah, I trust ya.
I have to say as much as I want to conserve them, about the only shark that wouldn't have me messing my wetsuit should I see it under water would be a nurse shark. Very easy to see it has a nice small mouth LOL.
sadly I'm not responsible for creating that...but its still brilliant, despite my lack of involvement ;)
See it's give and take, we eat shark, they eat us, natures balance :p lololol
Trantor!! Thanks for the X-mas card.
Everyone -- Tran is proof of an international audience on this blog MUHahahahahah.
Thanks for stopping by sir.
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