'Shark Week' taking a beating from scientist

The Discovery Channel's Shark Week is poised to scare the board shorts off unsuspecting mainlanders for the 28th straight summer, but the outlandish, hoax-like tales are too much for some shark lovers and actual scientists — many of whom have refused to be a part of the popular series.

"Why do you lie to your viewers by falsely claiming that megalodon is still alive," David Shiffman, a world-renowned shark researcher at the University of Miami, said during a social media chat hosted by Shark Week promoters. "Is reality not enough?"

Apparently reality is not enough for Discovery Channel.

Example: One promotion photo used for this year's series shows a man with a mustache wearing red board shorts riding two great white sharks as if they were skis. Of course there's a pretty lady hugging his right thigh as the man tosses chum into the air. Behind him, white sharks and hammerheads fly through the air, snatching the chum bits and sea gulls along the way.

Another image shows a sultry mermaid, a hoax the Discovery Channel has pushed for years now. There's also the fake megalodon, a supposed 50-ton eating machine. Producers used photos from "uncovered Nazi files" that show a U-boat near what they say is the outline of a 64-foot megalodon, a species actual scientists say disappeared from the planet 2 million years ago.

For other Discovery Channel rumors, check out the supposed shark in Lake Ontario, which, media outlets there report, stirred unfounded fears for many Canadians. For the record, there are no documented sharks in Lake Ontario, although the video hoax went viral — further clouding the facts and forcing marine biologists to waste their time explaining away rumors. Bull sharks can and do live in some lakes, but they prefer warmer waters in coastal regions.

Apparently there will be a zombie shark show this year as well, whatever those are.

But the silliness doesn't stop there. The Shark Week handle on twitter also contains ridiculous posts, such as: "Most sharks don't like the taste of humans, but their bites can be pretty darn deadly."

Apparently Discovery Channel has some magic way of understanding what eating a human would taste like to a shark. That or the producers can detect and interpret shark thought patterns.

Also, most shark bites are not deadly. According to the International Shark Attack File, published by the Florida Museum of Natural History, there were 72 unprovoked shark attacks in 2013 — with 10 of those being fatal.

The series starts Aug. 10, but I will not be watching. What started as a series that was at least quasi-science has turned into some type of aquatic fantasy land, where sharks are bigger than boats and fish don't like the taste of humans but are eager to kill them and any other person who dares enter an ocean.

— Compiled by Chad Gillis