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“I can’t believe that ‘please don’t grab the 18 foot long wild predator’ is something that needs to be explicitly said out loud, but here we are,” David Shiffman, a marine biologist who studies sharks, told The Washington Post in a Twitter message

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“Promoting through social media that it’s safe and okay to swim with these animals is irresponsible,” Domeier, who has spent years studying sharks, told The Post in a phone interview Thursday.

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“If you go shark diving almost anywhere in the world with a legitimate, respected shark diving operator, the very first thing they will tell you is, ‘Do not touch the sharks,’ ” he said.

“This is not shark advocacy...it is selfish, self-promotion,” Domeier wrote.

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Shiffman had an equally scathing rebuke of Ramsey’s actions.

“There is absolutely no reason for this person to grab and attempt to ride a free-swimming animal,” Shiffman tweeted. “It doesn’t show that sharks aren’t dangerous, it shows that some humans make bad choices.”

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Domeier said he hopes people will understand that great white sharks deserve the same level of respect as other predators.

“If you go on a safari in Botswana, you don’t grab onto the mane of lion and let it drag you around,” he said. “You just don’t do that.”