(POLITICOFIRE) – Shark advocates are calling for people to refer to shark attacks as “shark interactions,” according to a report in the New York Post.
Australian shark enthusiasts are urging the public to stop using the term “attack” when referring to shark bites, insisting that the media has “warped the reputation” of sharks and branded them cold-blooded killers. Instead, they suggest the term “interactions” as a more neutral descriptor of a bloody attack.
“‘Shark attack’ is a lie,” University of Sydney language researcher Christopher Pepin-Neff told the Sydney Morning Herald and insisted that most shark bites are mere “nips” and that the “choice of words can be potent since public fears about beach safety can be inflamed by alarmist language by politicians and the media.”
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