I TOTALLY believe you. A few years ago, I was in Rocky Mt. National Park photographing elk. I was in the middle of a large herd. I kept backing up, but they kept coming closer to ME as they grazed. It's not like I just walked right into the middle of a large herd of elk. Anyway, I was very calm (as I always am around critters, having majored in zoology with a specialty in animal behavior--I can "read" an animal from 100 feet away and tell you what's on its mind) and they were very calm. I was only about 15-20 feet away from the huge herd bull. He was totally unperturbed by me taking his picture and I kept slowly backing away as I did so, fully realizing how dangerous a critter he could be. I had been so close that I could hear the mewing sounds the elk calves made which I never knew they did. I was so close I witnessed an elk cow nearly stomp a coyote into pieces when it tried for her baby. Waaaay cool! I finally achieved a safer distance and the elk didn't approach me any more, when I spied some DUMB DUMB Darwin-award contenders walking right up to these animals like they were in a petting zoo. I told them in no uncertain terms, "Get away from those elk. They are wild animals. That bull over there with that armchair-sized rack of antlers could run you through with close to a thousand pounds of himself driving it through you. The rest of the herd could panic and stampede and grind us all to pulp. Idiots!" A minute later, I heard a voice behind me and turned around. It was a park ranger. He thanked me for probably saving some lives and then ordered the yahoos to back far away from where they were.
So yeah, I completely could believe idiot tourists would put a kid on a buffalo's back.
Years ago I had a summer job at a National park that always had bears roaming around looking for handouts from the tourists. It was not unusual to have a bunch of vehicles stopped along the road messing around with bears. Some people were even stupid enough to have fully grown wild bears standing up on hind legs to take photos. In some cases people would actually push the bear away from the camera to get a photo. Tourists can be very dumb as to dangers. Though I never heard of or saw one of these roadside incidents turn ugly/harmful I do know that in the same park a man had his chest ripped open when the man chased a couple of bear cubs away from the families picnic table after dark and mama bear got angry and waylaid him.