Day: May 8, 2025

Should killing nature be an international crime?

“From the Pope to Greta Thunberg, there are growing calls for the crime of ‘ecocide’ to be recognised in international criminal law — but could such a law ever work?” the BBC asked in a recent article.

Some courts have granted legal standing to sacred rivers, trees and landscapes and legal rights to non-human primates.

Numerous jurisdictions have ruled in favour of nature with respect to:

Pollution and other forms of destruction of nature

Trade in endangered species

Destruction of national parks, nature reserves and other protected areas and natural monuments

Before Dr. Manisha Deka became pregnant at age 38, she knew little about the benefits of lifting weights. 

“I have always been active, but I focused on exercises like running on the treadmill, yoga and Zumba classes,” said Deka, a specialist in internal medicine in India. “Those were the exercises that women tended to do at the time.”

Then she had a complicated pregnancy, which required her to stay in bed. “Once I gave birth and tried to stand up, I noticed that the muscles in my legs had lost all their strength,” Deka said. “I had to re-learn how to move, walk and climb stairs.” 

Some TikTok videos about health and fitness are hard to resist. People describe how they lost weight by eating only raw fruits and vegetables for a month or by substituting protein powder in place of flour or sugar. How many people take these recommendations to heart? What happens if they do?

Jason Wood was one of them. “I would sprinkle [protein powder] on top of a peanut butter sandwich or a yogurt just to make what I was eating seem healthier,” he said.

But Wood’s practice of adding protein powder to make his foods healthier wasn’t healthy. Eventually, Wood was diagnosed with orthorexia, an obsession with nutrition. Orthorexia is an eating disorder that differs significantly from better-known eating disorders like bulimia — bingeing and vomiting the food afterwards — and anorexia — not eating at all.