The War on Sharks

In early November 2013, the Western Australia government declared war on the sharks that surround its coast. This declaration of war will result in the government killing and culling many sharks in order to create a safe boundary for humans to surf and swim in. In order to create safety zones, the government has already started to implement a plan that involves the killing of many sharks that enter popular beaches such as Forrest Beach and Quinns Beach. According to VOANEWS, a DESCRIPTION, the authorities have started to hire commercial fishermen that will “hunt and kill sharks bigger than three meters in zones, while baited hooks will catch smaller sharks” The authorities intend on catching smaller sharks with baited hooks but this will result in catching other marine life such as fishes and whales. To an addition to these killing tactics, the government will soon install baited drum lines that would attract sharks. According to GUARDIAN, a DESCRIPTION, the drum lines will be “strung up 1 kilometer from the shores of heavily used beaches to catch sharks more than three meters in length” More than $20 million have been spent on the plan to protect the coasts from sharks. With these commercial fishermen, baited hooks, and drum lines, the beaches will no longer contain many marine life which is dangerous for the environment.
The Western Australia shark-cull plan has drawn the attention of many scientists. According to NATURE, a DESCRIPTION, the coast of Western Australia is a region “thought to be as part of the migration route for great whites” Alison Kock, a Shark-control researcher ,as well as, a marine biologist of the Shark Spotters programme, believes that although the many tactics will “undeniably reduce the risk of shark...

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... Is it morally right for humans to alter the natural system for the safety of a human who is entering a foreign world? Thoreau believed that wildness is a necessity for human survival and that the wildness of nature should not be tamed. He strongly believed that humans need the wildness of nature and “[a]t the same time that [humans] are earnest to explore and learn all things, [humans] require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by [humans] because unfathomable” (number). To put in other words, Thoreau believes that although humans need to explore and learn about nature, they need to make sure that nature is not fully explored and not altered in any way by mankind on land and in sea. Thoreau believes that every feature of the nature should not be altered, including the culling of sharks.