Translator: Martina Verdún Reviewer: Denise RQ
Hello everyone.
Basically, I'm here today to share with you
a different perspective
on the most maligned and misunderstood animal in our seas.
I'm talking about sharks.
But before I do that, I'll share with you a little bit about my background,
and how I arrived at this different perspective.
I'm a breath-hold diver.
Put simply, I don a mask, snorkel, and fins
I hold my breath, and I dive under the ocean surface.
Breath-hold diving is an ancient art form
that we, as humans, have been using for thousands of years
to hunt and gather under the sea.
It is still in use today,
with the Japanese Ama divers, the Tahitian pearl divers,
as well as others.
Breath-hold diving allows us
the possibility to interact with marine life
in a way that you could never do on scuba.
As breath-hold divers, we are far more mobile in the water column
because we're always returning to the surface to breathe,
but also, we're able to move quite quickly horizontally
to intercept or interact with an animal.
But also, for many species that inhabit the seas,
the releasing of air or blowing of bubbles which happens all the time scuba diving
is a sign of aggression.
What's really fascinating about breath-hold diving is our biology,
because we have something
that we share with all other marine mammals
- dolphins, whales, sea lions, seals-
it's called a mammalian diving reflex.
It means that when you hold your breath and dive under the ocean surface,
your body starts to slow your heart rate.
It also moves the blood out of your limbs towards your heart and brain
to try and safely prolong your time on a single breath of air
under the ocean surface.
I grew up fascinated by sharks.
Even when I was a little toddler, I was fascinated by photos of sharks;
as I grew older and learned to read, I began to read about them.
In school, I studied them, and I wrote reports on them,
and there was something that was very interesting,
particularly with the bigger species, like the tiger or the great white shark:
you would always see an addendum, even in a scientific paper,
that would state that the animal was extremely dangerous -
a known man-eater.
It's not that I'm an adrenaline junkie or an extreme sports fanatic
that I suddenly decided one day,
"Wow, you know what? I want to jump in the water with a bunch of sharks."
No.
Actually, it was a complete accident.
I was vacationing in Mexico 25 years ago.
I was hunting for my dinner, because I'm a spearfisherman as well.
I was about 800 meters from the shore, I was alone.
Back then, I didn't know any better, you shouldn't spearfish or free-dive alone,
but I was alone, I had just speared my dinner,
and I had just killed the fish when I felt something off to my right.
It was one of these.
To say I was frightened would be an understatement.
(Laughter)
Forget all of the technical data, "known man-eater"; oh, my god.
I was petrified, my heart started beating a thousand beats a minute.
I'm certain had my heart been capable of exiting my chest
and heading to the beach on its own, it would have.
(Laughter)
Fortunately, it couldn't. But I was shaking.
"Oh, my god, oh my god, oh my god, I'm going to die, it's going to eat me!"
And then I thought,
"Ah! It was the killing of the fish, the struggling fish that attracted it,
it's hungry. Oh great."
So I put the fish, and I moved back.
And guess what? it didn't want the fish.
Ah!
(Laughter)
"No! Oh, no! He's really hungry! Oh, no, no, no, no, no."
But there was still a part of me that was staying positive,
or at least a part of me that likes to eat food, because I love eating food.
I was not going to leave my dinner sinking to the bottom.
So I went to get my fish,
and because I was so petrified, and I was shaking,
I dropped my pole spear.
A pole spear is basically a two-meter long sharp, pointy stick.
To give you an idea of the size difference--
That's an idea of the difference between us.
This animal was more than four meters in length and above 500 kilos.
If you're facing something like this, that is supposedly a known man-eater,
don't drop the sharp, pointy stick.
(Laughter)
So I lunged to grab the stick
and poof! the supposed man-eater took off,
which was a complete shock.
I wasn't going to stick around, because I'm still freaking out here.
I started swimming to the beach, looking over my shoulder,
and the animal came back, and we did this dance;
it followed me, maintaining a distance.
if I swam towards it, it swam away, if I swam away, it followed me.
I know now this is called a security or safety distance.
This is not for me; this is for the tiger shark.
It's frightened that I'll hurt it.
We get closer to shore,
and I'm getting confident that I'm going to survive,
and maybe my heart is only beating at 300 beats per minute,
but I'm curious by nature, so I decide I want to experiment.
I dropped my gear on the sandy bottom,
and I swam aggressively at the animal which then took off.
I never saw it again that day, and I didn't see it in the subsequent days
but when I returned home, I went to the library
because I wanted to see if anyone else had had this experience.
I looked in the microfiche,
because the Internet didn't exist back then.
I didn't find anything about this kind of behavior,
but this motivated me to want to dive more with sharks
and for the next 20 years, I would have various experiences:
different species of sharks, sometimes the tiger shark,
but the next profound interaction was in 2008.
I was in South Africa with Mr. Fred Boyle, the photographer who took these images.
We work a lot together on shark conservation,
taking images like this to show the public a different perspective on sharks;
and also tagging sharks.
So anyways, we were there for French television,
filming something on sharks.
We had eight tiger sharks.
I had never seen that many tiger sharks in one place at one time.
On top of that, we had another 45 blacktip sharks.
I was taking a break, taking a drink of water from my water bottle.
I was in the water when I was bumped;
I turned to redirect a 4 plus-meter tiger shark,
which is to say that I actually redirected myself out of its path,
I threw my water bottle in the boat, and put my face in the water.
At this stage, I'm no longer frightened of sharks,
I understand them well enough to know they're not what they've been portrayed,
but I've never had a tiger shark do this.
The reason they bump things is to try and understand them.
So I watch her swim off, I have no idea what she's doing.
Fred lines up thinking that there would be some good photos.
(Laughter)
She turns around, and she starts swimming at me.
Her body language is not aggressive, so I'm quite confident that I'm fine,
but I have no idea what she's doing.
"Hello, hello!"
And we arrive here,
face to face.
If you look at the close up, what else is telling?
(Laughter)
It somehow looks like a house cat, but what's interesting--
(Laughter)
and it's a 4 ½ meter house cat.
The tiger sharks when they're aggressing, attacking, of feeding,
they cover the eye with a membrane to protect it.
Her eye is wide open, so we're in uncharted territory.
I have no idea what this animal is doing, so I let her move forward,
put my hands on her, redirect her, and then, as she moves forward,
I realize that if I don't let go, I'm going to be taken for a ride,
but I did let go, and I let the animal swim off.
She came back over and over and over.
Here's a supposed man-eater that is actually demonstrating itself
as a shy, cautious, and curious predator.
Throughout this expedition, we had countless opportunities
to interact with these animals and give them every opportunity.
If they wanted to attack us, they could have.
They never showed a single sign of aggression.
We've talked about the tiger shark,
but what about the king of sharks, the most feared animal in the sea,
the star of the film "Jaws," the great white shark?
Ooh.
I'd like you to watch this film, and just feel.
(Video starts) (Suspense music)
(Music and video end)
Uh!
Uh! What happened to the diver?
Now watch the finish to the sequence.
(Video starts) (Soft music)
(On stage) William Winram: Can you see how I try to manipulate you with music?
Which is often times what the media does,
they try to manipulate your perceptions of these animals.
In any one of these interactions, these animals could have attacked me;
but they did not, I'm the diver, I'm still here.
(Soft music)
This is a great white shark
(Music ends)
demonstrating itself to be a shy, curious, and cautious predator.
Throughout this expedition, when we first got in the water,
it took two hours before these animals
- there were five of them,
the smallest one was four meters in length -
became confident enough to approach us.
We were there to tag them, and obviously to photograph and film them.
They're always difficult to work with because they are so shy.
I'm not suggesting you all run out
and jump in the water with sharks or great white sharks,
because there are risks and dangers associated with this,
which we mitigate through our knowledge and experience,
but what I am saying is they're not as they've been portrayed in the media,
as mindless killing machines.
You've probably seen an image like this somewhere.
In 25 years of diving, I have never ever ever seen this,
but I know how they get these images:
they dump blood and chum, small pieces of meat, in the water.
This overstimulates the animal,
and then, they start teasing it
with a tuna head or a piece of meat on a rope.
The animal tries to feed, and they pull it away.
They do this for several hours, until the animal is really agitated.
Then, they break out the cameras, and they photograph or they film,
and then, they tell you that it's a mindless killing machine.
Why do I care? Why should you care?
We have this thing that we do as human beings:
we like to attach human behaviors to animals,
and we have two categories:
we have the villains, which is where we put sharks,
where we put all of the horrible characteristics of humanity,
and we attach them to the animal.
And then, over here, we have what I call the beautification camp:
this is where all the loving, wonderful, honorable animals are.
Over here, we stick lions, tigers, bears, hippopotamuses.
My favorite is the choice of the WWF in their branding: the panda bear.
I love panda bears.
As a kid, I had a teddy bear that was a panda bear.
My whole life, all I wanted to do,
was to see a panda bear and hug that panda bear.
(Laughter)
How good is that branding?
I was shocked when I was old enough, and I started researching panda bears
to realize that if I actually tried to hug a panda bear,
it could and would kill me.
Hippopotamus -
Not sure if you know this:
the hippopotamus is probably the most dangerous land-based animal on the planet.
Every year, it kills more human beings
than lions, tigers, bears, and sharks put together,
but we've given those animals all the wonderful attributes of humanity.
And over here we have sharks.
Sharks are evil, they're psychopaths, they're mindless killing machines,
and they're lurking in the depths to hunt us.
Neither of these perspectives are accurate.
They're both a lie, they're both dishonest,
because all of these animals are simply apex predators
that play an important role in their respective ecosystems.
They're just trying to survive.
Sharks in particular are trying to survive
the onslaught of humanity.
We kill-- an estimate is
75 to 100 million individual sharks every year,
we slice off their fins, and we throw them in the sea so suffocate.
We only want the fins for a bowl of soup.
Sharks have been around for... forever; millions of years,
yet now, because of us,
they've been pushed to the brink of extinction.
Most of the bigger, what are called pelagic species of sharks,
have had their numbers reduced by upwards of 90%
in a few short years.
If you look at this photo,
these are piles and piles of dead sharks waiting to have their fins cut off,
because now, we have legislation
that forces the fishermen to bring the sharks back to port.
If I were showing you a photo, and these were dolphins,
the public outcry would be enormous;
people would want to contribute to protecting dolphins
because we put dolphins in the beautification camp.
The problem with vilifying sharks
is that nobody cares about the villain, and nobody wants to protect them.
In 1968, Mr. Baba Dioum,
who was speaking to the Annual General Assembly of the IUCN
- he's a Senegalese environmentalist -
made this quote,
"In the end, we will conserve only what we love.
The problem is the media has made quite certain
that you will never love sharks.
How could you love a psychopathic, mindless killing machine?"
"We will love only what we understand,"
and again, how can you understand sharks if you've never been given the full story?
"We will understand only what we are taught."
So I hope that by sharing with you
a different perspective on these important predators in our oceans
that you will begin to understand
that they're not as they've been portrayed in the media,
and begin to contribute to their protection.
Thank you.
(Applause)