“If there’s such a thing as revolution
And there will be if we rise to the call
When we build the New Jerusalem
There won’t be no more ghetto at all.”
Joan Baez,“Ghetto”(1969)
September is already turning toward October, yet my laggard mind keeps thinking it’s August. I want to be ready for fall and the heavy rains that could be coming — or not. The rains could be coming to someone else instead. But rain or no rain, change is coming just as surely as the mulberry trees will drop their leaves. As long as we revolve around the sun, change is inevitable.
Is there such a thing as revolution? Since Wendell Berry’s death Aug. 31, I have been much more aware of the revolution he believed is necessary, and have heard echoes of the same change in others’ writings. He was fairly certain that without a better relationship to the land, we cannot really save ourselves. He was also fairly certain that there are powerful forces working against that revolution, and that unless we work against those forces working against us, hope is slim.
And that’s why I have taken so much hope in the stories cropping up around Tulare County of citizen uprisings against AI data centers, surprising not just me but also the governing units preparing to approve those centers. The county supervisor of my district, Larry Micari, was quite adamant about establishing a temporary ban on these approvals in the unincorporated areas, as well as wanting to send that message to the cities, too. Not long after the county voted a temporary ban, the city of Visalia did as well.
Many have remarked how amazing this is: ordinary people taking time out to attend meetings and protest big-time plans. But when you look at the way a data center can destroy the right to peace and quiet in the neighborhood, the right to electricity and water that the courts are starting to debate, the right to not have your property values decimated, all without compensation or even shame, this is a very reasonable response. Add to it the notion that these companies should not have to disclose their plans (and that planners have been fine with that idea), I think a little outrageous rage is appropriate.
I think another thing underlying the anger is that we have no other way to oppose this “revolution” the AI developers are inflicting on us without our consent. Opposing data centers is the only point in the entire process where the public has any power against the conversion to artificial intelligence, the dehumanizing of our society and our world. With revelations last week from Jacob Coxon, the whistleblower from Anthropic, that the developers know they are racing each other to be the one who destroys the world, we might just get some protective action from our elected representatives at last. Mutual Assured Destruction revisited? There has to be a way out of this.
But even if the world isn’t brought to an end by competing Intelligence units (they use us warmongers to train them, after all), the world as we know it is already slipping through our fingers. You may be retired or work in a field where human intelligence is more cost-effective than the artificial kind, but many more of us are likely to be replaced in the job market. If I’m one of those people, what will I do for a living? What will we do as a nation when the unemployment rate rises to 50%?
So I cheer those brave Tulareanos who started the local movement by opposing the Global Stack data center at the Tulare County Fairgrounds. I should have said so much earlier. You yelled loud enough to get heard. No one knows how it will come out, but it’s clear as day what would have happened if you had not stood up. Hopefully every other city in Tulare County will also pass a ban. You Fresno County residents may want to start making signs, if you haven’t already.
There is such a thing as revolution if we rise to the call. Thank you, neighbors. Press on.
Trudy Wischemann has been reading about the I.W.W. lately and practicing her banjo. Send her your dreams for a truly New Jerusalem c/o P.O. Box 1374, Lindsay CA 93247. This column is not a news article but the opinion of the writer and does not reflect the views of the Mid Valley Times newspaper.
