The shark attacks on the New Jersey coasts in 1916 that left 4 dead and 1 injured definitely were ignored by the new beach resorts on the Jersey shore at first since it was never proven that sharks on the Northeastern coasts in the US ever attacked a human and were thought by the "experts" of the day to be true. In one case an "expert" jumped off a boat off shore and swam with real sharks to demonstrate this point, shortly before the deadly in -shore shark attacks. You are correct in saying that when animals and marine life are predatory they don't really care who their next meal is.