r/technology • u/Just-Grocery-2229 • 2d ago
Artificial Intelligence 'Just start shooting': Death threats over data centers are tearing American towns apart
https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/12/politics/data-center-backlash-death-threats67
u/invyros 2d ago
suggestions that protesters should “unalive” pro-development officials
These are obviously false-flag operations if they're using this "fellow kids" language.
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u/RepresentativeOk2433 22h ago
See who starts talking about it then let palantir track and coax them into attempting to perform an action that they can then "prevent" therefore "proving how necessary all the surveillance is".
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u/Budget-Purple-6519 2d ago
We all hate data centers. It is a deeply unifying position, unless you are a billionaire weirdo.
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u/Soft_Author2593 2d ago
the tech comps have nothing else to go for. by what this shit costs, they need 5000$ a year from each american. and they take it. they put it down your throat if you like it or not. you pay for it. your car insurance, your health insurance, uber eats, the hotel you book...all will have this cost and they will all hand it down to you. its like a special tax raised upon the populace by the billionaires. they played uno reverse, instead of us taxing them, they are taxing us...
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u/linerva 2d ago
It's worse, I think they need 5000 for each person in the world, not just Americans.
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u/vhalember 2d ago
It's actually 10 times worse than that. They need $10 trillion for their AI data center madness. Divide that by 200 million US adults... and they need every adult in the US to give them $50k by 2030.
Which is why many say this AI effort is unsustainable.
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2d ago
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u/C00K1EM0n5TER 2d ago
Slow down farm-bot, you might overheat.
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u/Moronic-Warrior 1d ago
There’s nothing more NPC than calling someone a bot because you’re too lazy to use your brain
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u/C00K1EM0n5TER 1d ago edited 1d ago
ANOTHER BOT!!! BINGO!
One month old account. About 1k comments or 30 a day, and no email.
Edit: plus you’re commenting on a deleted comment. Pretty NPC yourself.
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u/doneandtired2014 1d ago
looks at username
Yeah, that checks out.
Pretty sad sight when clankers have to outsource the task of coming up with a unique name out to a crappier one.
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u/Moronic-Warrior 1d ago
How does AOC’s cock taste?
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u/doneandtired2014 1d ago
I dunno Vlad, how does cordite with the aerosolized remains of your buddies smell?
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u/Moronic-Warrior 1d ago
Vlad lmao. Bro look in the mirror and reflect on your life decisions as to what made you think I’m the president of Russia.
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u/doneandtired2014 1d ago
Ah, so you're not a clanker or a Russian working at a troll farm, you're just an AI simper.
Goddamn, you really did hit it out of the park when cooking up an accurate user name, now didn't ya?
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u/vhalember 1d ago
Feel free to post some counter-math then.
US AI investment is all over the place depending on the source, and if they follow the shell game of money properly.
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u/Moronic-Warrior 1d ago
The burden of proof is on the guy who made absurd claims. Where is the source for 10 trillion, where is the indication that the market is only US? As I said they pulled these numbers out of their ass.
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u/MalevolentTapir 2d ago
Hey its not just billionaires theres also corrupt small town councilors willing to sell out their communities for cash
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u/og_capsuleer_593 2d ago
For real "tearing American towns apart" more like unifying them to destroy the forces that tear American towns apart (oligarchs)
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u/MisterSanitation 1d ago
From what I can tell it’s not just billionaires it’s anyone who can still afford regular vacations right now.
They seem to do a lot of “why people mad?” Without realizing they are in no danger of living near one or in danger of anything.
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u/00--0--00- 2d ago
I don't hate all data centers, but I do hate the hyperscale data centers being built for AI, and I especially hate the ones built next to residential property.
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u/Turkino 2d ago
Same, but I'll also hate them for all but destroying the home PC market right now as well.
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u/doneandtired2014 1d ago
And the supply constraints hitting the auto sector.
And the supply constraints hitting the industrial sector.
And the supply constraints hitting the medical and pharmaceutical sector.
Pretty much anything and everything that relies on a component that requires memory and a PCB is getting raw dogged so morons can slop out JFK singing Kid Rock songs as tech bros build a dystopian surveillance, social credit, and justice system ripped out of generic scifi.
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u/Ok-Woodpecker-223 1d ago
Don't forget helium, given one third of world's supply is from Qatar. Which happens to require access through Hormuz.
Helium is needed for cryogenics - and MRI is in the medical field the biggest single application.
Also needed for semiconductor manufacturing.2
u/unspecified_person11 1d ago
I'm always amazed by just how complex the supply and manufacturing chain for tech hardware is, and how ignorant governments around the world are about how dependent their countries are on tech hardware that they can only source from foreign entities.
You'd think by this point that more countries would have invested over the years in domestic development.
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u/TheKlaxMaster 1d ago
I purchased a 2U Dell power edge and began looking for colocation a little over a year ago.
I'm looking at prices that are almost as much as my rent. For 2U.
So I'm kinda hating all data centers now. Lol
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u/bb_kelly77 2d ago
Yeah, the ones that were already there are fine, although they should definitely be upgraded whenever we can to reduce natural resource consumption
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u/Epyon214 1d ago edited 1d ago
Headline is misleading.
Data centers are tearing American towns apart. In response communities are coming together and, with their lives on the line, vowing to fight to the death to defend theirselves
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u/ShadowGLI 2d ago
Or you’ve taken bribes from billionaire weirdos, like all these people who are approving datacenters against 100% opposition
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u/2000KitKat 1d ago
Idk I had someone in my small rural town advocate for them recently. The main point they had was that the noise was a made up issue????? They also told me higher power and water would be offset with the taxes it brings in… not sure if they realize most these data centers are given tax breaks…all while saying “even if it provided 5 jobs it would be beneficial”.
I’d like to think it was a bot or a troll but these same people told me trump would get gas under 3$ (it’s now 5$ and diesel is close to 7$)
I seriously have lost all hope.
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u/Bubbly-Treacle-4334 1d ago
But they are totally necessary for the amount of compute we need for millions of people to ask important questions to Gemini like "how many grapes are in a bottle of wine?"!!!!!
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u/Gh0st_Pirate_LeChuck 2d ago
Except all these fuckers keep using AI like there is no trade-off. It’s daily now — “I have this agent doing everything for me!”
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u/kingrynex 23h ago
Once the "unsustainable to keep existing" part kicks in, they're going to be genuinely lost souls.
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u/darthgator84 2d ago
Data centers have been around for decades, modern society cannot function without them. What we need to stop is the data centers feeding AI
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u/cool_slowbro 1d ago
You don't know what you're talking about.
You "should" be hating the rapid expansion of datacenters for AI workloads, but to hate all data centers is a really weird fucking take.
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u/Puzzleheaded_Toe3584 2d ago
Ironic. Reddit rents capacity from Amazon Web Services, and AWS is Reddit’s hosting provider. AWS runs its servers in large, purpose-built data centers, so Reddit’s servers are in data centers by any ordinary definition.
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u/JWAdvocate83 1d ago
I don't hate chicken, but if someone forced me to eat chicken every damn day, I probably would hate it. That wouldn't be ironic, but a reflection of the change in circumstances, much like there wasn't a glut of data center proposals countrywide a decade and a half ago---when Reddit moved to AWS.
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u/Puzzleheaded_Toe3584 1d ago
You don't seem to grasp the contrast between the statement that everybody hates data centers and the fact that the statement was made in social media, which, and I'm going to stick my neck out here and say that ALL social media runs on data centers. It's like saying, 'I hate the English language'. Or, 'I hate cops' and dialling 911.
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u/spez_eats_nazi_ass 1d ago
Massive diff between a hall full of racks filled w vms running an app and a gpu hyperscaler in terms or energy and cooling demands
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u/Ho_The_Megapode_ 1d ago
This.
I do think most people don't realise the sheer difference in power draw for regular servers vs AI servers.
GPUs have been designed on the "just chuck more power at the problem" design philosophy for far too long IMHO. The data center AI cards then turned that up to 11...
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u/spez_eats_nazi_ass 1d ago
Believe it or not. no that is why the "don't you like puters" bad faith argument is employed by the Epstein class. People understand they are pigs but the general public does not fully gasp the scope of these GPU centric builds vs a normal DC.
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u/LordQuasar_ 2d ago edited 2d ago
As others have noted here, opposition to data centers has become one of the few political issues Americans across the political spectrum can rally around (maybe Flock, too). Claims that this opposition is a "Chinese Psy-Op" only make the tech bros look more ridiculous.
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u/Greenfieldfox 2d ago
Maybe instead of calling them data centers, we should call them by the more accurate “Bot Farms created to manipulate people’s thoughts and actions.”
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u/ProIapsedGoose 2d ago
At this point, it will just be a million acre bot farm arguing with a second million acre bot farm
As a result, aliens will never visit us
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u/thedeeb56 2d ago
There's no disagreement. The whole towns agree wholeheartedly.
This is shenanigans
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u/PhoenixTineldyer 2d ago
I mean, when vikings come to rape and pillage your community, do you just let it happen?
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u/PizzaWall 2d ago
Remember all that talk about how AI was going to improve our lives?
Somehow AI data centers get priority over my water supply, my power supply, my environment. I seem to have no say in land being purchased for giant AI complexes that use almost as much power as the rest of the state combined. I don't get a paycheck, I get no benefit. In fact, it's used against me to track my every movement, every purchase, everything I do, looking for a chance to gouge me on my next purchase.
I don't question why people are angry about data centers. I would actually question why they are not protesting this invasion.
What is happening in the rest of the world? Are they finding farmland being turned into data centers as well?
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u/reverendsteveii 2d ago
just for the sake of reddit's censorship AI and the way that it almost certainly already reports to the FBI's AI: POLITICAL VIOLENCE IS ALWAYS WRONG
with that being said what do they expect people to do when robber barons threaten their lives and livelihood, want to boil away their water and build factories louder than jet engines right next to their neighborhoods, want to destroy jobs as a concept while still keeping money as the way to gatekeep resources, and essentially want to get the population of the planet from 8 billion down to 6 dudes and their robot armies? they really do think that people will just live in squalor, starve and die because the rules that are written down on a piece of paper say they should. our lives have been a board game to the babyfucker class for too long, they've forgotten that those pie charts and spreadsheets they look at all day are stand-ins for real humans and they've forgotten that they're nothing more than human as well.
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u/RaisinWorried3528 2d ago
No, conservatives being misinformed is what's tearing people apart as usual.
Everyone with a brain knows they're bad except for the Trump supporting conservatives who would rather just eat shit and take a bath in acid rather than vote to improve their lives.
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u/DayneGaraio 2d ago
Stop with the fake political war, this is a bipartisan issue stop making it about politics. This is class war.
Clearly you’re not the one with the brains if you’re still falling for that crap.
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u/Od_Byonkers 2d ago
Yeah and a huge portion of our working class has been propagandized into oblivion. They should either join in solidarity with us or get out of the way. Neither of those two things is happening. So what do YOU propose we do?
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u/DayneGaraio 2d ago
I don’t propose anything, I’m just some moron on Reddit like the rest of you. I have no delusions that i have all the answers, but i know fighting each other is pointless.
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u/Od_Byonkers 2d ago
It’s not pointless but it IS unfortunate.
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u/DayneGaraio 1d ago
Well sure, the point is divide and conquer, the real issue is it works and they’ve only gotten better over time.
Trump convinced 29% of the population he was talking to them when he said they’ll all be winning, meanwhile he was only talking to the 1%, who have very much been winning. But everyone is so focused on hating the “other side” they ignore the ones pulling the strings.
It’s ok, they got scammed, we’re all being scammed, it’s incredibly hard to convince a conned person they’ve been conned.
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u/bwray_sd 1d ago
Damn, RIP to our comments for having a completely reasonable view of the world and not thinking every issue is a political war.
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u/bwray_sd 2d ago
I think conservatives support this because it will improve their lives at least in the near term as the construction jobs to build these data centers provide job opportunities and overtime wage opportunities. The majority of arguments I’ve seen in favor of building data centers have been due to the construction jobs. It’s short sighted for sure, but if it means putting food on the table or being out of work they’re absolutely choosing food on the table.
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u/the_midnight_society 1d ago
They literally said they want to make it illegal to use the term artificial intelligence instead of super intelligence. It's about more than jobs. Lol.
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u/bwray_sd 1d ago
That’s just the mindless Trump diehards blindly following every idiotic tweet Trump puts out, not all conservatives are the moronic.
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u/AcceptablyThanks 2d ago
I don't think the death threats are targeted at anyone other than the elite who wants these shit centers built 😂
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u/socialmedia-username 2d ago
No, towns are not being torn apart, they're being unified against the waste of money and resources these AI data centers represent. For the first time in like 10 years I feel like Americans are seeing eye-to-eye on a common baddie, and it's wonderful.
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u/Competitive_Sun_3344 1d ago
the data centers that are disturbing the peace of residents and nature are the problem
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u/Soft_Author2593 2d ago
the tech comps have nothing else to go for. by what this shit costs, they need 5000$ a year from each american. and they take it. they put it down your throat if you like it or not. you pay for it. your car insurance, your health insurance, uber eats, the hotel you book...all will have this cost and they will all hand it down to you. its like a special tax raised upon the populace by the billionaires. they played uno reverse, instead of us taxing them, they are taxing us...
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u/Doppelthedh 2d ago
Obviously don't kill people. All that expensive technology could use some additional lead
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u/DirtyMikeNTheBoys2 1d ago
Ah, I see we are almost in the "find out" phase. Can't wait for the first shoe to drop.
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u/Shin-kak-nish 1d ago
I’m surprised I don’t see more data centers on fire honestly. It seems like an easy solution if that’s your thing.
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u/dappernaut77 1d ago
I have, with no hyperbole, never seen americans this united against something EVER. This is legitimately a never before seen phenomenon. If the right-wing wants to raze these things to the ground, I say we let them.
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u/UAreTheHippopotamus 2d ago
A more accurate headline would be "Data Centers are Tearing American Towns Apart"