I usually point out that the world we've built isn't necessary and that things like "GDP" going up are actually indications of greater degrees of human exploitation rather than 'progress'

If private actors pollute public water to the point where it's no longer safe to drink, and people need to buy filters or import it, GDP goes up as a market has been created. Has society been improved by that?

A far as diverging from the mainstream, personally I offer critical support to AES states in their struggle to navigate these contradictions as this isn't a simple knot to untangle, and keeping alive bickering from almost a hundred years ago is silly.