This wonderful egalitarian woman, like billions of other egalitarians, wants real, not fake, democracy. The massive protests occurring now against AI data centers is an example of people trying to get real democracy during our current dictatorship of the rich. Go here to see 500+ photos of more wonderful egalitarians in my zip code.
Our dictatorship of the rich is foisting AI data centers on people against their will, and people are resisting this as best they can:
The number of bans being enacted against data centers is increasing across the U.S., with one tracker listing 14 new bans from March to April. According to the U.S. Data Center Moratorium Tracker, there are currently 50 active bans across different jurisdictions, with an addition of four local governments enacting a permanent ban in their area of responsibility. There are also three proposed bans, plus several more in various stages, including those in the process of creating a new ban, exploring the possibility of a ban, and some with expired bans.
Many AI hyperscalers in the U.S. are rushing to build data centers across the nation, especially as they rush to become the dominant force in AI. However, this unbridled investment in data centers is resulting in shortages of various resources. We’re currently in the midst of a massive memory and storage chip shortage, and we soon might see a CPU shortage, especially as AI inference workloads increase. However, the construction of AI data centers has a direct impact on the communities that surround them, especially when it comes to increased electricity costs and noise and air pollution.
Wholesale electricity prices have skyrocketed by up to 267% in the past five years as utility providers are forced to upgrade their infrastructure to handle the increased demand from data centers. However, the upgrade costs are being passed on equally to the data centers and the average consumer, resulting in higher utility bills for everyone. It has gotten to the point that President Donald Trump met with the biggest AI tech companies in the White House and made them promise to “pay their own way” with the “ratepayer protection pledge.”
Data centers and warmongering: what explains all of this activism against the data centers?
Because resistance to a data center is a local issue, Americans are still somewhat hopeful that their resistance can succeed. This is in contrast to Americans having become pessimistic about being able to stop the federal government from doing something they don’t want.
American have-nots, who are fed up with being ruled by a dictatorship of the rich, learned that they have no control over the federal government when they experienced how Trump, who got their votes by promising to end the warmongering of former presidents Bush Sr. and Bush Jr., continued the warmongering against Russia in Ukraine and against Iran—to the dismay and disgust of even his MAGA base.
Americans who are not (yet) willing to “riot in the streets” to stop the warmongering are willing to try every legal means possible to get their local governments to stop the AI data centers because they still have some confidence that such resistance can succeed. This explains the wave of activism against the data centers.
We shall see what happens when people discover that they have no more control over their local governments than they do over the federal government.
The AI billionaires seem determined to build their data centers come hell or high water and despite what local governments may do. These billionaires do indeed have the power (currently) to get away with it (just as they get away with warmongering that the public opposes). What will happen?
At some point, millions of American have-nots will start talking about how REALLY to gain control of their own government (they know that “taxing the rich” doesn’t do it.) There will be a huge public conversation about this. The idea of removing the rich from power (the obvious requirement for getting real democracy, as everybody already knows full well) will be taken more and more seriously. People will start to discover that it is actually possible, and can be done like this.
Here’s what good people are now saying about AI data centers:
Yes John, this issue of the proliferation of data centres may well be a hill too far for the AI oppressors. With the price of water and power being significantly affected by the persistent and growing AI demands and the realisation that AI is properly more accurately described as Artificial Imprisonment, the people may at last unite in opposition. I think if this domino falls it could start an avalanche of resistance.
Good insights here. Repurposing the old Nancy Reagan slogan, "JUST SAY NO." And mean it!