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Aaron Vansintjan

@avansi.bsky.social
988 followers 313 following 44 posts

Read my newsletter, Another Day On Earth: aaron.eo.page Books: The Sustainability Class, The Future Is Degrowth

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(Au)drey Wang Gosselin @dreyslashthem.bsky.social · 28/01/2026
For me, this book didn't feel particularly revelatory because it's just common sense. Infinite growth is impossible on a finite planet, and measuring economic stability with a single metric (GDP) completely flattens and obstructs reality. @matthiasschmelzer.bsky.social @avansi.bsky.social #climate
Book cover of "The Future is Degrowth: A Guide to a World beyond Capitalism"Page from "The Future is Degrowth: A Guide to a World beyond Capitalism" outlining the seven forms of growth critique central to Degrowth: ecological critique, socioeconomic critique, cultural critique, critique of capitalism, feminist critique, critique of industrialism, South North critique.
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CCPA — Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives @policyalternatives.ca · 14/01/2026
A public grocery network across Canada could save families approximately 30-45% off their grocery bill, depending on where they live—and would only cost a reasonable amount to set up. By @avansi.bsky.social @grocerynerd.bsky.social Raj Patel Anna Paskal www.policyalternatives.ca/news-researc...
policyalternatives.ca
How public grocery stores could work in Canada - CCPA
Chances are you spent some of your holiday gatherings talking about the price of food. Costs to consumers have increased by almost 30 per cent since 2020, while mega-grocers doubled their profit margi...
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Ira @ira.bailey.nz · 28/10/2025
Fantastic short video on how a publicly owned grocery chain would work in Canada. Any #NZPol Food Policy policy nerds on here keen do some analysis on how this might work here in Aotearoa NZ?
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/10/2025
"Instead of the President's Choice, imagine... the People's Choice" An explainer I made with @breachmedia.ca www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPuE...
youtube.com
Why Canada needs public grocery stores
YouTube video by The Breach
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/06/2025
Great discussion with Nick on @broadbent.bsky.social's new Class & Climate podcast. Give it a listen!
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Broadbent Institute @broadbent.bsky.social · 06/06/2025
🎙New Class & Climate episode: @avansi.bsky.social‬ + Vijay Kolinjivadi join‪ @greeneconnet.bsky.social's Nick Pearce to take on the “sustainability class” and show why green consumption isn’t enough. Listen here: perspectivesjournal.ca/the-sustaina...
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 13/05/2025
Potentially of interest to @erikamorris.bsky.social @catsenay.bsky.social
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 12/05/2025
Join us for our Montreal book launch for The Sustainability Class on May 22 at Pulp Books. We'll be joined by Alejandra Zaga Mendes, MNA for the party Quebec Solidaire in Verdun. @thenewpress.bsky.social pulpbooks.ca/events/26445...
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 25/04/2025
Our event with @haymarketbooks.org yesterday is now up on Youtube! It was a delight to hear what Ashley and Emma had to say about what environmentalism for everyone looks like. @thenewpress.bsky.social @emma-river-roberts.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuCa...
youtube.com
The Sustainability Class vs Working Class Environmentalism
YouTube video by Haymarket Books
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Haymarket Books @haymarketbooks.org · 24/04/2025
LIVE NOW! Join @ashdawson.bsky.social , @emma-river-roberts.bsky.social , @avansi.bsky.social , and Vijay Kolinjivadi for a discussion on how to reject the “sustainability class” and instead build a working class environmentalism. Stream here:
youtube.com
The Sustainability Class vs Working Class Environmentalism
We are currently witnessing the dismantling of environmental policies and a reversal of climate commitments on a large scale. But what kind of environmentali...
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Phil Free @philfree.bsky.social · 20/04/2025
“In fact, the future on offer by the sustainability class is not sustainable at all. Or rather, it only promises to sustain the present order of things—which all indicators suggest is hurtling towards ecological breakdown…” #degrowth @avansi.bsky.social www.counterpunch.org/2025/02/21/a...
counterpunch.org
Action on Climate Change May Look Different Than You Expect
Talk a walk through the Los Angeles’ Arts District, and you’ll learn that there's nothing contradictory about trying to save the world and living a luxury
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Haymarket Books @haymarketbooks.org · 18/04/2025
Join @ashdawson.bsky.social , @emma-river-roberts.bsky.social , @avansi.bsky.social , and Vijay Kolinjivadi for a discussion on how to reject the “sustainability class” and instead build a working class environmentalism. Thursday, April 24 at 2pm ET RSVP: www.tickettailor.com/events/hayma...
The Sustainability Class vs Working Class Environmentalism

Thursday, April 24 at 2pm ET
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Emma River-Roberts @emma-river-roberts.bsky.social · 18/04/2025
How can we reject the sustainability class, and build a working class environmentalism capable of progressive change? 🌏 Join us Thu Apr 24, 2-3:30pm EDT (7-8.30pm BST) as we discuss this key climate issue: @ashdawson.bsky.social @avansi.bsky.social www.tickettailor.com/events/hayma...
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
yes, all this and more is in the first few pages of our book!
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jeanmariemink.bsky.social @jeanmariemink.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
The book was on the New Books shelf at Ann Arbor’s district library. Just finishing the introduction and already I see the connections behind Trump/Musk actions in such stark focus - from gentrification, nearly complete over-class, minerals mining in Greenland! Ukraine! The world’s oceans! The moon!
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 16/02/2025
Heading to the US for some book events, with @vijaykol.bsky.social and @eleanorfinley.bsky.social
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The Working Class Climate Alliance @wccalliance.bsky.social · 14/02/2025
"If the members of this class are to be more than a green aristocracy, they must relinquish their grip on the environmental narrative." @kevinini.bsky.social reviews The Sustainability Class by @vijaykol.bsky.social & @avansi.bsky.social wccalliance.org/the-sustaina...
wccalliance.org
Book Review – The Sustainability Class: How to Take Back Our Future from Lifestyle Environmentalists
Written by Kevin Picado 14th February 2025 Norway, widely praised for its green policies and renewable energy initiatives, has cultivated a reputation as a global leader in sustainability. Its land…
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Lizzy 🌝h @lizzyoh.bsky.social · 22/01/2025
Hanging out with Aaron and Vijay to talk about the distortion of sustainability to equal green consumption with moral implications and ask: what is to be done?
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 20/01/2025
We’ll be announcing more dates soon in cities like Montreal, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Toronto ... contact me if you’d like to help set something up.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 20/01/2025
Register for the Greenpoint library event here www.bklynlibrary.org/calendar/sus...
bklynlibrary.org
The Sustainability Class with Authors Vijay Kolinjivadi and Aaron Vansintjan | Brooklyn Public Library
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 20/01/2025
The Sustainability Class is heading to New York City! Come see us talk at two different events: Greenpoint Public Library, Brooklyn Saturday January 25, 1:00-2:30pm Woodbine, Queens Sunday January 26, 4:30pm @vijaykol.bsky.social
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 16/01/2025
They're going for geoengineering and extracting the very last drop. A friend also pointed out that in this context, nuclear energy is abysmally stupid. There will be no one around to contain waste for the millennia needed—add to that geopolitical and climate disruption. But hey, SMNR will save us.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 16/01/2025
Actually it's more than that, the title is wrong... according to the report, GDP would fall by 50%, not GDP growth. That's astronomically worse. It also predicts 4 billion people will die—much much worse.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 13/01/2025
"speculative leftist conversations about the potential necessity of CCS and other 'modern' technologies appear naive and irrelevant—these are the means of our class enemies, seeking only to prolong and intensify the uses and extent of fossil fuels." -@kaibosworth.bsky.social
spectrejournal.com
From Fossil Capital to Green Capital – Spectre Journal
Kai Bosworth reviews Adam Hanieh's Crude Capitalism, arguing that Hanieh's analysis hellpfully emphasizes the "capitalism" in "fossil capitalism."
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Degrowth Collective @degrowth.bsky.social · 10/01/2025
Everyone must read this great book by @avansi.bsky.social and @vijaykol.bsky.social !
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 20/12/2024
I can also report that zoomers and Gen Zs love the term "third places". I thought this was sociology jargon and relatively obscure, but it's like it is used all the time by young people?
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 20/12/2024
Nothing can be eco-friendly until the ecological debt is paid. In this excerpt from our book, @vijaykol.bsky.social and I describe the uneven distribution of labor, nature, and debt that props up rich nations—and their supposedly green solutions. www.cetri.be/Nothing-can-...
cetri.be
Nothing can be ‘green' or ‘eco-friendly' until the ecological debt is paid – Centre tricontinental
William Kapp came up with the idea of a cost-shifting success in his ahead-of-its-time book The Social Costs of Private Enterprise.1–2 A cost-shifting success is when the costs of producing…
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Anand Giridharadas @anandwrites.bsky.social · 18/12/2024
He died as he lived, clicking “Forgot password,” then checking his inbox for a code, then putting in that code, then setting up two-step verification, and then waiting for the text message that doesn’t come, and then calling the 800 number, and then downloading an authenticator app, and dying.
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CETRI - Centre tricontinental @cetri-be.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
Nothing can be ‘green’ or ‘eco-friendly’ until the ecological debt for the historical and ongoing exploitation driving environmental collapse is paid. By @vijaykol.bsky.social & @avansi.bsky.social 👇 www.cetri.be/Nothing-can-... #ecologicaldebt #climatedebt
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
Same. Across the board, colon cancer rates are going up among young adults. Also, cancer rates amongst women under 40 are going up a lot. www.theguardian.com/society/2024....
theguardian.com
Bowel cancer rising among under-50s worldwide, research finds
Study suggests rate of disease among young adults is rising for first time and England has one of the fastest increases
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 14/12/2024
Here's @vijaykol.bsky.social and I in today's TIME magazine. "Strangely, in the middle of ecological breakdown threatening the very basis of human life to thrive on this planet, superyachts or luxury tourism resorts are just not up for public debate." time.com/7200268/ultr...
time.com
The Trouble With the Ultra-Rich's Environmentalism
Zero-carbon mansions and super-yachts are less a sign of a sustainable future than a highly exclusive one.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 13/12/2024
"The more our political energy goes to the politics of self-expression, the less there is for the fights we really need to win against mass deportation, mass incarceration, the climate crisis." by @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social www.teenvogue.com/story/trump-...
teenvogue.com
The Bad Guys Don’t Really Care What Kind of Leftist You Are
Infighting is a waste of energy.
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Matthew Archer @matthewarcher.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
looking forward to getting my hands on this new book by @vijaykol.bsky.social and @avansi.bsky.social the back cover makes me think of nicole seymour's excellent "bad environmentalism" and how liberal sustainability vilifies the working class. more of this!!! thenewpress.com/books/sustai...
thenewpress.com
The Sustainability Class | The New Press
A sustainability apartheid is emerging. More than ever, urban residents want to be green, yet to cater to their interests, a green-tech service economy has sprung up, co-opting well-intentioned concer...
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Matthew Haugen @mjhaugen.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
I was fortunate to receive an advance copy of this and started reading it recently. It's great so far and I'm excited to dig in further!
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
This is from our book, The Sustainability Class: How to Take Back Our Future from Lifestyle Environmentalists, out today with @thenewpress.bsky.social thenewpress.com/books/sustai...
thenewpress.com
The Sustainability Class | The New Press
A sustainability apartheid is emerging. More than ever, urban residents want to be green, yet to cater to their interests, a green-tech service economy has sprung up, co-opting well-intentioned concer...
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
Green gaslighting is a kind of psychological torture. That's why it is so effective in justifying the “sustainability” of the status quo. Green gaslighters are doing nothing, or even making things worse, while claiming they are the heroes of the day.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
Those who’ve had to live through some of the worst kinds of abuse, and now are faced with the holier-than-thou attitude of their abusers, are very likely to question their own sense of reality.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
It’s far more insidious than greenwashing. Green gaslighting is about being able to displace, violate, or abuse others under the guise of being sustainable and progressive—all while questioning the sanity of those abused.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
Whether we are talking about green war crimes or absurd climate solutions like mining bitcoin off gas flares, green gaslighting helps perpetrators of ecological degradation take the green credit while they make the victims appear to be the culprits.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
And despite having burned the equivalent of 150,000 tons of coal within just the first sixty days of its bombardment of Gaza—surpassing the annual emissions of whole countries like Belize—Israel still shows up to United Nations conferences touting its action on climate change.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
Yet, while a Palestinian’s per capita carbon emissions are about 0.8 tons per year, Israelis emit about twelve times that amount, at just under 10 tons per year per capita.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
Today, Palestinians are arrested, interrogated, tortured, injured, and murdered merely for harvesting herbs, for crossing into new conservation areas that were their cattle grazing grounds, or for practicing livelihoods that made the land fertile and lush.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
This is all justified with the slogan “let the desert bloom". The idea is that local Palestinians have mismanaged the desert and only settlers can make it green.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
In place of this unique biodiversity, new settlers planted monocultures of European pine trees in newly claimed "conservation areas". These monocultures made soils more acidic, reduced undergrowth, and enhanced the likelihood of fires, which have further devastated regional ecologies.
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Aaron Vansintjan @avansi.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
It's not just corporations, but also whole countries. Consider Israel. When Israel was declared a state in May 1948, many native trees like oaks, carobs, and hawthorns as well as agricultural crops like olives, figs, and almonds were destroyed.
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