despoil

There is an economic aspect to the story in that greed is driving developers to despoil these areas because they see profit.

From Salon ● Mar. 2, 2023

He calmly rejects criticism that his vision would despoil the biosphere.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 1, 2023

The project would despoil a mostly pristine wilderness area.

From Seattle Times ● Dec. 7, 2022

That measure is opposed by members of the local Mura tribe, who say mining would despoil the natural habitat upon which they depend.

From Reuters ● Mar. 23, 2022

Yet we have made the vow; and though no other human generation hath done other than despoil, perhaps we shall be the first.

From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves" by M.T. Anderson

Unfortunately, your visit to Glacier NP was an example of exactly the kind of behavior that despoils and degrades our parks and wildernesses.

From New York Times ● Sep. 20, 2016

There are many benefits of not selling water in disposable bottles in national parks, including reducing trash at parks, carbon emissions and the litter that despoils our parks, landscape and waterways.

From Washington Post ● Jul. 24, 2015

Roger is jealous when Jane flirts with Manishewitz Jr.—“I thought you liked the crabs rangoon here!”—and despoils her new, Roger-free apartment accordingly.

From Slate ● May 14, 2012

Stinking garbage and human excrement despoils Thailand's majestic River of Kings.

From Time Magazine Archive

In one direction it despoils and permits the ruin and proscription of the superior class, the nobles, the members of Parliament, and the upper middle class.

From The French Revolution - Volume 1 by John Durand

Metaphors may have no place at a concentration camp, but it’s hard to look at this beautiful enclosed space and not see it, perversely, as the most despoiled of Edens.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 14, 2023

Too much of Seattle has been despoiled by the greed and power of developers.

From Seattle Times ● Feb. 18, 2022

They despoiled the building with their urine and feces.

From Washington Post ● Dec. 16, 2021

The natural environment with which Native Americans had established a harmonious and symbiotic relationship, was similarly despoiled by the twin logic of expropriation and colonization that spread under the logic of manifest destiny.

From Scientific American ● Aug. 10, 2021

Because he was a good man and our faithful friend, therefore hast thou despoiled his wife.

From Medieval English Nunneries c. 1275 to 1535 by Eileen Power

Miners hauled in hydraulic equipment to dig and dredge and strip the mountains, polluting the runoff so badly that in 1874, the flatlanders who depended on that water went to court to stop the despoiling.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 11, 2025

Plastic, along with other litter, is also despoiling the landscape and polluting our waterways.

From Seattle Times ● Dec. 7, 2023

I just wish I hadn’t let my fandom lead me into the fluorescent-lit land of plot despoiling.

From New York Times ● Dec. 10, 2022

A global explosion of disposable plastic, which is made from oil and gas, is increasing carbon emissions, despoiling the world's oceans, harming wildlife and contaminating the food chain.

From Reuters ● Feb. 18, 2022

But in the background of all the conversations among the visitors to the island was indignation at the despoiling of the roads they had traveled.

From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson