The latest scare tactic: label data-center resisters as the problem.
A financial news site recently ran an article titled “Civilizational Suicide”: China’s Humanoids Sprint Ahead As Americans Fight Over Data Centers And Socialism. It featured video of Chinese robots marching in formation at the opening of the Robot Olympics in China. You can watch it here: https://x.com/shen_shiwei/status/2091427919587643861?s=20
Chinese humanoid robots marching in formation are supposed to scare us into dropping the fight against data centers. The gist is simple: be afraid – be very, very afraid. Build the new data centers, or the big bad Chinese humanoid robot army is coming for our country.
The article quotes Arthur MacWaters, co-founder of Legion Health, an AI-native telepsychiatry company, as if he were an expert we need to listen to:
“We’re having debates about data centers, and China is publicly developing superhuman robot armies. What the actual hell are we doing here, guys?”
So we are supposed to take national-security advice from the owner of an AI telepsychiatry company. We need data centers, he says, so we can build superhuman robots to beat China’s superhuman robots. Could he have a motive tied to his own AI psychiatry business and the data centers it would need? Just what we need right now: AI psychiatrists. Right? [1]
It’s Not Only the Democratic Socialists of America Opposing Data Centers
The article then uses another tactic. The author pins the blame solely on the Democratic Socialists of America:
“The timing is dangerous. As China expands its AI infrastructure, advanced-manufacturing base, and military power, DSA proposals to block new data centers and neuter US defense capabilities would undermine two pillars of national power.”
That framing makes opposition look un-American and paints anyone who resists as a Democratic Socialist. In reality, Americans across the political spectrum are opposing data centers. The hope is that this tactic of being labelled a socialist will stop conservatives like me from opposing data center build out. It won’t work. More than 70 percent of Americans do not want a data center built in their community.
Data Centers Do Not Build Robots
The fear campaign is deceptive in two ways. First, data centers do not build robots.
Second, one video the article used showed a huge army of humanoid robots marching and running in formation, supposedly at the Robot Olympics. When I researched the games, I could not find photos of those robots in the opening ceremony. The clip was not from the ceremony at all. It was a promotional video for the games.
The real opening-ceremony march looked a lot less threatening.
Here is a question: “Do we really believe that the U.S. Department of War is not already building a robot army?” We know they are. Maybe they do not want the world to know what our robots can do. Maybe they just are not showing off our robot army at the games the way the CCP is.
China likes to show off. So I am not impressed. But say we are behind in building “humanoid” robots. The cause is not a lack of data centers.
We Don’t Need “More” Data Centers to Train Robot Brains
Data centers do not build robots but they can be used to train AI robot brains. The US already has far more big computer data centers than the rest of the world combined. In theory, we could point some of that computer power at training robot “brains” instead of running everyday AI chat tools. We can survive without AI slop and AI psychiatry, can’t we?
Still the Problem is not lack of Data Centers for the AI brain training. The bigger problem is teaching them how to move and handle the real world. That requires lots of real practice data from actual robots trying things and collecting that data is slow and expensive. Computer simulations help, but they do not fully match reality. A robot that looks smooth in a video game can still tip over or drop objects when it steps onto a real floor. Even perfect computer training does not fix the physical robot.
At events like the World Humanoid Robot Games, robots still struggled with basic balance, grip, and reliability. That is mostly hardware and real-world practice problems, not a lack of computer time. Some robots ran faster than human world records in short sprints, but many still fell, overheated, or needed padded walls at the finish line because they could not stop smoothly.
Robot bloopers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpL16olNJvc
So more data-center power would help the software side of the problem, but it would not magically produce useful robot armies or workers tomorrow.
A Bigger Problem is With the Supply Chain
Key parts needed for capable robots (especially humanoids or advanced ground robots) face major supply-chain risks:
- Strong permanent magnets (the kind used in almost every joint motor): China controls roughly 90 percent of the world’s finished high-performance magnets and most of the refining. These magnets are essential for compact, powerful motors. Recent Chinese export restrictions already caused disruptions. The US is trying to rebuild its own magnet industry, but production is still small compared with demand.
- Precision gearboxes and reducers (the “joints” that let robots move smoothly and accurately under load): These are dominated by a few Japanese companies, with Chinese firms catching up fast. The US has almost no large-scale production of the high-quality versions needed for good robots.
- Actuators and motors overall: These combine the magnets and gearboxes above. China has a big cost and scale advantage because of its huge electric-vehicle industry, which uses many of the same parts.
Other components (certain sensors, specialized materials) also lean heavily on foreign suppliers.
In Summary: Computer power helps, but it is not the main blocker. The harder problems right now are real-world robot experience and a reliable, scalable supply of the physical parts. So stop blaming Americans who oppose the building of AI data centers.
One Step From Full Blown Fascism
I will close with the thought that should scare you most. The real dystopian nightmare is not some distant sci-fi plot. It is technology built and sold in the name of national security being turned inward, used against the people who paid for it with their tax dollars. Used to watch, score, restrict, and police the smart cities that globalist technocrats are already constructing. Used to force a digital currency system on the world so the elite ruling class can control and restrict buying and selling. That future is not coming. Pieces of it are already here.
Fascism is not only boots and banners. In its economic core, it is the merger of state power with concentrated industry. The government picks the winners. The industries write the rules. The public lives under both. We are not in full blown fascism yet. We are one step closer to it. Technology, telecommunications, agribusiness, Big Pharma, Wall Street, the defense contractors, energy, insurance, etc., have aligned with federal power. They do not compete under the law. They write the rules, collect the subsidies, capture the agencies, and govern from the top down. That is not a free market. That is not a constitutional republic. That is the merger of state and industry, and it is already operating here in the once free USA. That is the real civilizational suicide.
[1] https://www.zerohedge.com/technology/civilizational-suicide-chinas-humanoids-sprint-ahead-americans-fight-over-data-center