Sharkwater Critical Essay

Sharkwater Critical Essay

        Media has created myths that shark is fierce man-eating animals. However, Canadian biologist Rob Stewart made a documentary film called “Sharkwater” to shows the real face of shark. In his film, he tries to convince people that shark actually is a very shy and harmless animal, and he also explores that the huge profits in shark fin industry caused overfishing of shark. Also, he wants to awake people’s awareness of protecting shark. Rob Stewart’s documentary is rhetorically persuasive because it makes effective use of logos, pathos and ethos.

        Stewart made two very strong and powerful assumptions in the film. Firstly, Paul Watson, the captain of “Sharkwater”, said that “I don't know of any governments or institutions that are doing anything to solve any of these problems. All over the world, though, I am seeing individuals and non-government organizations that are passionately involved in protecting ecosystems and species, and that's where I see some optimism that's where results are happening” (Watson). This stated assumption is very strong, because Rob Stewart, Paul Watson and other individuals are using their own abilities and trying to awake people’s awareness to protect shark. As a result, they successfully encouraged some countries banned shark finning. This action proves that sometimes individuals are more reliable than government. Another unstated assumption that majority of people would agree sharks are cold-blooded predators, and this is a negative stereotype of sharks. In order to show the real face of sharks, Rob Stewart swims with sharks for many times in the film, and he even can touch sharks’ skin and play games with them. All these assumptions shows that people has misunderstood shark for a long time and it actually not that harmless than we think. In other words, we should protect shark instead of expressing hostility, and individuals can more effectively to change the world than government.

        Stewart’s appeal of logos is convincing and well-supported. Firstly, he uses his personal experience to well prove his opinions. He has spent thousands hours swimming with sharks, and survived every time, this shows that sharks are not as cruel or dangerous as people think. He uses his own experience to persuade people we are misunderstanding sharks. Also, he interviewed some experts and their expertise opinions prove the authenticity of Stewart’s statement. For example, Doctor Erich Ritter (shark behaviorist) claims that sharks are not the animal that bites the most by statistics, he also points out the fear of shark might come from “Jaws”. The statistic shows that sharks only bite five people in total for every year, elephants and tigers are more dangers than sharks, and they kill 100 people each year. He also indicates that Human beings will suffer a lot if we continually ignore issue about overfishing. Just like one proponent of shark protecting claims in the film that killing sharks would be the ecological time bomb in the near future. Moreover, Rob Stewart explained the importance role of sharks. Actually, human depends on ocean for oxygen, and the ocean is controlled by sharks. If sharks are extinct, the marine ecosystem damage would be damaged. In other words, human might probably lost control in oxygen we need. Rob Stewart also pointed out the huge profits caused shark overfishing. It is estimated that about 23-73 million sharks were killed each year for shark fin soup (statistics based on 2006). According to the United Nations Environment Program, shark population has plunged by 90% in the Gulf of Mexico and the Mediterranean Sea while by 75% in the northwestern Atlantic Ocean in the last 15 years. All the evidences showed by Rob Stewart are making his statement more powerful to persuade people that protect sharks becomes an urgent matter; also, the interviewed experts’ opinion and statistics make the film become more convincible.