Latest / How To Protect The Ocean / Shark Week 2025 Why Shark Week's "Dancing With Sharks" Episode Got It So Wrong

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Shark Week 2025 Why Shark Week's "Dancing With Sharks" Episode Got It So Wrong · How To Protect The Ocean

• 0:00
  I sat down to watch the kick off of Shark
• 0:02
  Week 2025 hoping for science, respect and
• 0:05
  wonder.
• 0:06
  What I got was a circus act
• 0:07
  disguised as conservation.
• 0:10
  Dancing with sharks opened up with
• 0:12
  handlers hugging, riding
• 0:13
  and hand feeding wild sharks.
• 0:16
  They call it graceful.
• 0:17
  I saw it as
• 0:18
  performative and disrespectful.
• 0:20
  These aren't props, they're predators,
• 0:22
  majestic, misunderstood
• 0:23
  and already under threat.
• 0:26
  Having sharks in a tonic state to
• 0:27
  entertain the audience
• 0:28
  crosses a serious ethical line.
• 0:31
  I couldn't believe that this was the
• 0:33
  headline act of the one of
• 0:34
  the world's most influential
• 0:36
  shark broadcasts.
• 0:37
  Shark Week was supposed to inspire
• 0:38
  protection, not promote domination.
• 0:41
  If this is how we teach people to love
• 0:43
  sharks, we're doing them a disservice.
• 0:46
  Let's talk about why this episode did
• 0:48
  more harm than good and
• 0:50
  what shark conservation
• 0:51
  should actually look like on this episode
• 0:54
  of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast.
• 0:56
  Let's start the show.
• 1:00
  Hey everybody, welcome back to another
• 1:01
  exciting episode of the How
• 1:02
  to Protect the Ocean podcast.
• 1:03
  I'm your host, Andrew Llewyn.
• 1:04
  And this is the podcast where you find
• 1:05
  out what's happening
• 1:06
  with the ocean, how you can
• 1:07
  speak up for the ocean and what you can
• 1:09
  do to live for a better
• 1:10
  ocean by taking action.
• 1:12
  If you want to take action, do not watch
• 1:15
  Dancing with Sharks.
• 1:16
  It was a horrible episode.
• 1:18
  We'll get into that in just a second.
• 1:20
  Before we do, though, if you really want
• 1:22
  to know how to be
• 1:23
  guided to live for a better
• 1:25
  ocean truly guided, I want you to go over
• 1:28
  and join the undertow.
• 1:30
  Go to speak up for blue.com
• 1:31
  forward slash join the undertow.
• 1:33
  It is an online community that I've
• 1:35
  partnered with some
• 1:35
  co-founders Serena and Amanda to
• 1:37
  build this online community to help
• 1:39
  people and guide people
• 1:41
  to not only reconnect with
• 1:42
  the ocean, but to help guide them towards
• 1:44
  making better decisions for the ocean.
• 1:47
  It's an app.
• 1:48
  It will contain the podcast and will
• 1:50
  contain extra information,
• 1:51
  interactive virtual meetings
• 1:53
  and so forth.
• 1:54
  It's going to be really exciting.
• 1:55
  Go to speak up for blue.com forward slash
• 1:57
  join the undertow to
• 1:59
  get on the waiting list.
• 2:00
  The app is coming soon.
• 2:03
  I can't wait for it to come to you to
• 2:06
  your hands and be able
• 2:07
  to get access to all of
• 2:09
  the shark information and ocean
• 2:10
  information as you please.
• 2:13
  Let's get it back into the show.
• 2:15
  This is disappointing.
• 2:17
  I am just going to say right off the bat,
• 2:18
  I was a little excited
• 2:19
  to kick off the month.
• 2:21
  We had shark fest with Nat Geo, had some
• 2:23
  great episode and had
• 2:24
  some not so great episodes.
• 2:25
  I reviewed the shark whisper, not so
• 2:27
  great on Netflix, a
• 2:29
  documentary on ocean Ramsey.
• 2:31
  It kind of sucked.
• 2:32
  I reviewed all the sharks, great episode,
• 2:35
  had some diving things
• 2:36
  going on, but overall
• 2:38
  great episode, really learned about
• 2:39
  sharks, really learned about the
• 2:41
  biodiversity of sharks.
• 2:42
  I thought that was fantastic.
• 2:43
  I really liked how they talked about how
• 2:45
  rays and stingrays and manor rays are
• 2:48
  part of the same subfamily.
• 2:49
  Elasmal branks, cartilaginous, fidget,
• 2:51
  conjurates, cartilaginous fish.
• 2:53
  It's always great to see when you are
• 2:55
  able to insert education and
• 2:58
  entertainment at the same time.
• 3:00
  So that edutainment, I
• 3:01
  think is what they call it.
• 3:02
  I thought it was really great.
• 3:04
  However, when we talk about shark week,
• 3:06
  we have to be careful because shark week
• 3:09
  has really disappoint us in the past and
• 3:11
  sometimes really impressed
• 3:12
  us with some of their show.
• 3:13
  And there are some shows that I'm still
• 3:15
  looking forward to watching this week.
• 3:18
  But to start off, to kick off the show,
• 3:21
  to kick off the week of shark week, one
• 3:23
  of the biggest weeks and most popular and
• 3:26
  top rated weeks of shows on sharks and
• 3:29
  just the environment and discoveries.
• 3:31
  I think of the
• 3:31
  biggest week for discovery.
• 3:32
  Don't quote me on that, but it's one of
• 3:34
  the biggest weeks for this channel.
• 3:36
  You start off with dancing with sharks.
• 3:39
  Now, there is a great channel called
• 3:41
  shark bites. There's a scientist on
• 3:42
  there. I can't remember his name right
• 3:44
  now, but he's fantastic.
• 3:45
  He's got a huge channel and I'll link in
• 3:47
  the show notes below.
• 3:48
  He actually talked about how he was going
• 3:50
  to maybe be on the show.
• 3:53
  They asked him. The producers asked him
• 3:54
  to be on this show. He didn't know what
• 3:55
  it was really about.
• 3:57
  He's got a great story of how he followed
• 3:58
  along the process because he wanted to
• 4:00
  see what this was about.
• 4:01
  If it's about science, he
• 4:02
  was really interested in it.
• 4:04
  Like I said, shark week has provided some
• 4:05
  great scientific shows.
• 4:07
  And then he realized quickly that dancing
• 4:09
  with sharks was
• 4:10
  literally dancing with sharks.
• 4:12
  It was taking these shark handlers and
• 4:15
  calling them dancers, but they weren't
• 4:16
  really dancers, teaching them how to
• 4:18
  dance underwater and
• 4:20
  handle sharks at the same time.
• 4:22
  Essentially, it was dancing with stars,
• 4:23
  but except the stars were sharks.
• 4:26
  And if you think about the concept,
• 4:27
  nothing is interesting about that.
• 4:30
  There's nothing interesting. It
• 4:31
  absolutely sucks when you think about.
• 4:33
  I don't know how this got approved by
• 4:35
  Discovery. I don't know how people said,
• 4:38
  Hey, you know what? Dancing with sharks.
• 4:40
  That's a great idea.
• 4:42
  Let's take sharks. Let's go underwater.
• 4:43
  Let's go in their habitat. Sharks that
• 4:45
  don't like to be touched, don't like to
• 4:47
  be handled and let's hug them.
• 4:49
  Let's sit on them. Let's ride them and
• 4:51
  thinking that's a good idea. Let's hand
• 4:53
  feed them because you know, the sharp
• 4:54
  teeth aren't a danger to anybody.
• 4:57
  And let's do this and let's entertain
• 4:58
  people. Then we'll judge the
• 5:00
  people. It's a competition show.
• 5:02
  All the sharks was a great competition
• 5:03
  show. Dancing with sharks sucked. Okay.
• 5:07
  It is the worst thing I've ever seen.
• 5:10
  Now they got Tom Bergeron, who used to be
• 5:12
  the host of America's home videos or
• 5:15
  whatever. It wasn't entertaining. He was
• 5:17
  great at commentating. Now he was
• 5:18
  commentating this. He was hosting this
• 5:20
  and it just like it was awkward.
• 5:22
  It was horrible to see like what these
• 5:25
  dancers did and what they had them do to
• 5:27
  interact with sharks was absolutely
• 5:29
  horrible. It was absolutely the worst
• 5:31
  thing I've ever seen in my entire life.
• 5:34
  They had someone from Dancing with Stars,
• 5:36
  a choreographer, you know, talking about
• 5:37
  the technique of the dancing that a
• 5:39
  choreographer to teach the dancing a
• 5:41
  separate person to teach the dancing to these divers.
• 5:42
  They had a diver and they named her a shark expert, but I don't know how much of a shark actually is maybe in diving because she's gone diving with a lot of sharks. Definitely not on the science side that I saw could be wrong on that. I didn't do much research too angry to be honest about this. Then they had this comedian that was on who was probably the most realist of all people was like, why am I here? Why are we doing this? This is not right. And you know, he had to judge people. He's like, you're still dancing with sharks, which is awesome. I think he said one time and he's just funny. He's like, I'm not even gonna do this. He's like, I'm not gonna do this. He's like, I'm not gonna do this. He's like, I'm not gonna do this. He's like, I'm not gonna do this. He's like, I'm not gonna do this. He's like, I'm not gonna do this. He's like,
• 6:12
  you know, I'm not any comedian outside of
• 6:13
  this, but he's just like probably the
• 6:14
  most realist person. He's like, why are
• 6:16
  we doing this? What are we doing this for
• 6:18
  this makes no sense. And it's true. It
• 6:21
  made no sense right from the get go. And
• 6:23
  when you watch the performances I watched
• 6:25
  I was going to turn off after five
• 6:26
  minutes because it was so disgusting. I
• 6:28
  want to watch the whole thing. So I want
• 6:29
  to see if they put some education. They
• 6:31
  did put one piece one clip where they
• 6:33
  talked about hammerhead sharks and they
• 6:35
  did some education, but for the rest of
• 6:38
  the time was just absolutely all about
• 6:40
  man handling sharks.
• 6:42
  hugging sharks, one
• 6:42
  person, one diver, quote unquote,
• 6:45
  dancer fell and sat under
• 6:47
  the head of a nurse shark
• 6:48
  because she got off balance.
• 6:50
  You know, it's obviously
• 6:51
  not something she's used
• 6:52
  to doing underwater, but
• 6:53
  she did it and she fell
• 6:55
  on the shark and, you
• 6:56
  know, like didn't probably
• 6:57
  harm the shark, but
• 6:58
  obviously it's not helping
• 7:00
  when you start touching
• 7:00
  the shark and inadvertently,
• 7:02
  you know, sit on a shark.
• 7:04
  There's one person who
• 7:05
  actually like rode the shark,
• 7:07
  like grabbed a nurse shark by either side
• 7:09
  and actually rode the shark.
• 7:10
  Another person was
• 7:11
  holding it and tickling it.
• 7:12
  I think it was actually the
• 7:13
  same person, a nurse shark.
• 7:15
  And look, these nurse
• 7:15
  sharks are not harmful to people.
• 7:17
  They have this ability to suction.
• 7:19
  People have been, you know, quote unquote
• 7:20
  bitten by nurse sharks
• 7:22
  because they're all in around it and
• 7:23
  they're in around when they're
• 7:24
  feeding and probably inadvertently got
• 7:25
  bit these influencers.
• 7:27
  But in this case, like
• 7:28
  nobody got hurt, but the fact is
• 7:30
  these sharks are being handled.
• 7:32
  One time somebody put them in a tonic
• 7:33
  state and they think, oh, that's great.
• 7:35
  They put them in a tonic state.
• 7:36
  What a way to handle the sharks.
• 7:38
  No.
• 7:40
  No, do not touch the sharks.
• 7:44
  You know, like I thought
• 7:44
  the shark was first bad.
• 7:45
  I thought ocean ramage was bad.
• 7:46
  This is awful.
• 7:48
  This is absolutely horrible to be able to
• 7:51
  say that this is educational,
• 7:53
  to be able to say that
• 7:54
  this is entertaining.
• 7:56
  Watching people handle sharks, literally
• 7:59
  handle sharks in a dance for no reason.
• 8:01
  Whatsoever.
• 8:02
  There's no science behind it.
• 8:03
  There's no conservation body.
• 8:05
  In fact, you can argue that they were
• 8:06
  more harmful to the
• 8:07
  sharks than they were to
• 8:08
  protect the sharks.
• 8:09
  I don't know what the
• 8:10
  purpose of the show is.
• 8:11
  It wasn't entertaining.
• 8:13
  It was awful.
• 8:14
  There was no charisma.
• 8:15
  There was no fun.
• 8:17
  It sucked.
• 8:18
  It absolutely sucked.
• 8:19
  Everybody was awkward.
• 8:20
  I think sometimes people were just so
• 8:22
  surprised that they were
• 8:24
  doing this and being like,
• 8:26
  what decisions that you made in life made
• 8:28
  you come to this show and do this show?
• 8:30
  I don't know what the
• 8:30
  production company was saying.
• 8:31
  And this was absolutely awful from a
• 8:33
  scientist, from a
• 8:34
  conservationist, from just watching
• 8:36
  this show.
• 8:36
  It enraged me.
• 8:38
  I had to leave the
• 8:38
  show a number of times.
• 8:40
  I haven't been this enraged in
• 8:41
  sea-spiracy, to be honest.
• 8:43
  And I was just like, what in the world
• 8:45
  are people thinking?
• 8:46
  To kick off Shark Week 2025 by doing this
• 8:51
  and putting on this
• 8:52
  dancing with sharks and
• 8:53
  thinking that this is a good idea.
• 8:55
  It really makes me wonder what people at
• 8:58
  Shark Week are thinking.
• 8:59
  I understand you want to maybe push the
• 9:01
  boundaries a little bit,
• 9:02
  but to put on this absolute
• 9:04
  garbage and say that this is how we're
• 9:07
  going to kick off Shark Week 2025.
• 9:10
  Horrible, absolutely horrible.
• 9:12
  Now with that said, I did watch the other
• 9:14
  two shows that were on that night.
• 9:16
  They were about great white sharks.
• 9:17
  They were about orcas that were harming
• 9:19
  the great white sharks
• 9:19
  in South Africa and where
• 9:21
  these sharks went.
• 9:22
  Dr. Alison Towner, who's been on the
• 9:24
  Beyond Jaws podcast,
• 9:24
  interviewed before, did a great
• 9:26
  job.
• 9:27
  They had Andy Kesegande that was on
• 9:28
  there, who's a videographer for them.
• 9:30
  They really showed a lot of the science.
• 9:31
  They really showed some great whites, not
• 9:33
  touching them, not manhandling them.
• 9:35
  Of course, you're not going to do that
• 9:36
  with a great white, but it
• 9:37
  was really very interesting.
• 9:39
  Some parts I liked, some parts I didn't
• 9:40
  like, but at least it
• 9:41
  showed some science.
• 9:42
  At least it showed
• 9:42
  something like what was going on.
• 9:45
  One of them was looking for colossus,
• 9:46
  like Air Jaws, that they
• 9:48
  haven't seen this shark
• 9:48
  in 10 years or almost 10 years, looking
• 9:51
  for the shark and
• 9:52
  saying, was it in South Africa?
• 9:54
  Was it in New Zealand?
• 9:55
  Talking about how we've discovered that
• 9:57
  South African sharks
• 9:58
  can travel to New Zealand.
• 10:00
  So wondering if that's where they went as
• 10:01
  adults or that's where
• 10:02
  the shark called colossus
• 10:03
  went as an adult.
• 10:05
  They couldn't find it obviously, but
• 10:06
  there was a big shark
• 10:07
  that might have been it in
• 10:08
  New Zealand, but they
• 10:09
  don't know for sure.
• 10:11
  Obviously, they're going to be doing some
• 10:12
  more studies on that.
• 10:13
  And then the other episode was talking
• 10:15
  about great white
• 10:16
  assassins, a great white shark
• 10:17
  assassin is the port and
• 10:18
  starboard in South Africa.
• 10:20
  And they're looking to see if there is
• 10:21
  any predation of orcas in New Zealand.
• 10:25
  Dr. Alison Towner, and with another
• 10:26
  naturalist, went over to New
• 10:28
  Zealand to look at any type
• 10:30
  of markings or any type of evidence if
• 10:32
  these great whites were
• 10:33
  being predated upon or harassed
• 10:35
  by orcas.
• 10:36
  There's an orca
• 10:36
  population in New Zealand as well.
• 10:38
  So they did some small experiments, you
• 10:40
  know, TV type experiments.
• 10:41
  I thought it was interesting.
• 10:42
  So I like those episodes more than
• 10:45
  Dancing with Sharks.
• 10:46
  I would rather get bitten by a shark than
• 10:48
  watch that again, Dancing with Sharks.
• 10:49
  That was absolutely atrocious.
• 10:52
  Shark week people that prove that should
• 10:54
  be a shame, they should be fired.
• 10:56
  That was absolutely awful.
• 10:58
  What these people did with sharks.
• 11:00
  I don't know if this is a normal thing.
• 11:02
  Hand feeding sharks to the point where
• 11:03
  you're trying to guide
• 11:04
  them, like your hands are
• 11:05
  so close to their mouths, not only being
• 11:08
  like putting yourself in
• 11:09
  danger, but really affecting
• 11:11
  the sharks by hand feeding
• 11:12
  them is a huge no no in my books.
• 11:14
  I thought it was absolutely awful.
• 11:16
  In the Shark Whisperer review, when I
• 11:18
  talked about Ocean Ramsey
• 11:19
  handling sharks and riding
• 11:21
  sharks, that was awful.
• 11:22
  This was even like 100 times worse.
• 11:25
  It was 100 times worse.
• 11:26
  And if this is what happens on a regular
• 11:28
  basis, absolutely awful.
• 11:30
  This should not be a thing that is done
• 11:33
  at any point in time.
• 11:35
  The people should be
• 11:35
  ashamed of what they're doing.
• 11:37
  I can't believe this was on national TV,
• 11:40
  to be honest, or international TV.
• 11:41
  Absolutely horrible.
• 11:43
  So that's my review.
• 11:44
  I would love to hear your thoughts on
• 11:45
  Dancing with Sharks.
• 11:47
  You know, what'd you think?
• 11:48
  Did you think it was even entertaining?
• 11:50
  Really up to know what people thinking.
• 11:51
  Not attacking anybody, of course.
• 11:53
  Everybody has their own opinion.
• 11:54
  I don't love what they're doing with
• 11:56
  sharks and harassing them.
• 11:57
  I feel like they're just encouraging
• 11:59
  people to say, hey, we can
• 12:00
  actually touch sharks and
• 12:01
  put them in a tonic state.
• 12:03
  And it's actually cool to do that.
• 12:04
  It's not as awful to do that.
• 12:06
  Do not do that.
• 12:07
  Do not listen to these programs when they
• 12:09
  say this is something
• 12:10
  that should be done.
• 12:11
  It's absolutely awful.
• 12:12
  Horrible example, but I'd
• 12:13
  love to hear what you think.
• 12:14
  Honestly, what'd you
• 12:15
  think of the episode?
• 12:16
  Please let me know in the comments if
• 12:18
  you're watching this on
• 12:19
  YouTube or you can go to
• 12:20
  speakupforblue.com forward slash contact.
• 12:22
  Email me.
• 12:23
  Fill out the form or
• 12:24
  goes to my personal email.
• 12:25
  You can also go on Instagram and DM me at
• 12:27
  how to protect the ocean.
• 12:29
  And of course, don't forget to join the
• 12:30
  undertow by going to
• 12:31
  speakupforblue.com forward slash
• 12:33
  join the undertow.
• 12:34
  That's speakupforblue.com
• 12:36
  forward slash join the undertow.
• 12:37
  It's in the links in the show notes.
• 12:39
  But other than that, I want to thank you
• 12:40
  so much for joining me
• 12:41
  on today's episode of the
• 12:43
  How to Protect the Ocean podcast.
• 12:45
  I'm your host, Andrew Lewin
• 12:46
  from the True North Stronger.
• 12:47
  Have a great day.
• 12:48
  We'll talk to you next time.
• 12:49
  And happy conservation.