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submitted 22 hours ago by brachiosaurus@mander.xyz to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
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[-] AnnaFrankfurter@lemmy.ml 2 points 6 hours ago

You know because arms industry has arms they can use to threaten and kill us

[-] Leon_Grotsky@hexbear.net 10 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago)

Some of us have been, since the 2000's if not earlier (can't speak to that personally.)

Here's the description of Abby Martin's new film "Earth's Greatest Enemy":

Earth’s Greatest Enemy, the second feature film project by Abby Martin, is a groundbreaking anti-imperialist environmental documentary.

Exempt from international climate agreements and rarely scrutinized in mainstream reporting, the Pentagon is the world’s single largest institutional polluter—spewing carbon, contaminating water, and scarring landscapes across the globe. Combining investigative journalism, striking visuals, and stories from impacted communities, this film challenges audiences to rethink the hidden costs of a global military empire and its planetary consequences. Provocative, urgent, and eye-opening, this is a documentary that will change how you see both the military and environmentalism.

[-] HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 18 points 17 hours ago

The complaints about the arms industry/the cost of war has been around since recorded history.

AI server farms has only been around for a few years.

[-] PonyOfWar@pawb.social 57 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

People protesting agains the arms industry will generally focus on the bigger problem, which is all the people being killed.

"Stop murdering people" is probably a more powerful message than "Stop wasting resources on murdering people".

[-] WellTheresYourCobbler@hexbear.net 20 points 18 hours ago

Speak for yourself I’ve BEEN complaining about the wasted resources not to mention the evil nature of the arms industry

[-] Azarova@hexbear.net 19 points 18 hours ago

Because for people in the imperial core, AI slop invading every part of the internet and making it viscerally worse is more visible and tangible than imperialism destroying lives and the environment (mostly) abroad.

[-] racoon@lemmy.ml 9 points 16 hours ago

I live in a Catholic country. Well, I know, countries can’t have religions. Let’s say that the élites impose the marketing and propaganda of that corporation. Every year, they block the streets with massive far-right demonstrations. People dressed as KKK wander the streets burning candles which cost thousands in manpower to clean. On the other hand, when I was younger, people would freely gather at night to have drinks in the street squares. They would litter a lot. The press used to create a great problem about the people drinking but not about the people dropping candle wax.

Pollution, as crime, is only a political concern when it’s done by the lower classes

[-] MNByChoice@midwest.social 26 points 20 hours ago

People have protested the military industrial complex for decades and centuries. Possibly even millennia.

YOU not being aware of it is different from it not happening.

Stop the false equivalency and whataboutism.

[-] brachiosaurus@mander.xyz 3 points 16 hours ago

People have protested the military industrial complex for decades and centuries.

Here on lemmy i've seen more people cheering up at europe's rearmament than i've seen complaining about the military industrial complex power waste.

[-] MNByChoice@midwest.social 2 points 16 hours ago

Europe is supporting Ukraine in an existential fight for their lives.

This is far different from wanting to generate a false naked picture of some person.

[-] wuphysics87@lemmy.ml 5 points 20 hours ago

Well that escalated

[-] HubertManne@piefed.social 1 points 20 hours ago

yeah the crazy mileag of tanks and when they talk about how much every flight of a warplane costs its not just personelle. I guess its sorta good we have nuclear ships.

[-] MNByChoice@midwest.social 1 points 16 hours ago

This is all true.

Plus the pointless murdering of humans.

[-] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 7 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

Because you get accused of wanting all Ukrainians to die if you oppose the mainstream narrative. And before that it was about being against freedom or something.

All mainstream media stands together to brainwash people for the military industrial complex.

[-] PM_ME_VINTAGE_30S@lemmy.sdf.org 25 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

I mean I'm also pissed about the war industry wasting our precious resources on death and destruction. I can be pissed about multiple things! The depths of my hatred for capitalism are literally limitless! It's just that the "death and destruction part" dominates my opposition of the industry.

[-] RedstoneValley@sh.itjust.works 4 points 15 hours ago

Ok let me try a different angle. I think the reason why AI is such a hotly debated topic right now is that AI is something that influences the lives of white westerners directly, while war is an abstract concept for most. To put it more bluntly, you're in contact with AI stuff every day, but there are no tanks rolling down your street (yet - but that might change soon).

[-] PolandIsAStateOfMind@lemmy.ml 14 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

Because war industry is an old story and killing people mostly happen in global south which is benefitting capitalist core so average liberal/conservative just see it as benefit and jobs. AI is new and trendy boogeyman and it's at home.

[-] sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 11 points 20 hours ago

Ai is new and added on top of that. Most of us have realized we aren't gonna stop the military industrial complex unless there is a revolution

[-] ClathrateG@hexbear.net 4 points 16 hours ago

Stopping or curtailing the former could viably be done through regulation in a 'liberal democracy' and is thus conceivable to libs, stopping the latter would require huge change in the management of states and their interrelations which the lib mind cannot/does not want conceive

[-] DJKJuicy@sh.itjust.works 4 points 18 hours ago

The Military Industrial Complex has been normalized over centuries. Humanity just can't stop killing each other. It's an instinct that evolved to be helpful to survival at one point thousands of years ago but may actually mean the end of humanity soon.

AI and all of the resources it consumes have not yet been normalized to anywhere near the level of "Defense".

Give it time and average humans will care just as little about all the resources consumed by AI as they care about all the resources consumed by war. Unfortunately I seriously doubt that it will go the other way around and humans will suddenly start caring more about the resources consumed by the Military Industrial Complex. That ship has sailed...

[-] brachiosaurus@mander.xyz 3 points 15 hours ago

Humanity just can’t stop killing each other. It’s an instinct that evolved to be helpful to survival at one point thousands of years ago

Killing other humans is not an instinct at all. Self defense when threatened is an instinct, people get tricked by these in power to feel in danger and to kill others.

[-] LeeeroooyJeeenkiiins@hexbear.net 3 points 19 hours ago

Weapons actually do something you could consider useful, burning up an acre of the Amazon to generate a sfw image of Nami from one piece isn't

[-] brachiosaurus@mander.xyz 3 points 15 hours ago

I would argue generating art is less harmful for humanity than crafting weapons designed to kill others and wage war.

[-] LeeeroooyJeeenkiiins@hexbear.net 1 points 15 hours ago

some AI slop hallucination of a character it didn't create isn't art

kill others and wage war

yes those are uses of weapons

[-] m532@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 17 hours ago

Wielding the debunked accusation like a club.

[-] Schmoo@slrpnk.net 1 points 16 hours ago

AI is new, the military industrial complex is not.

[-] florencia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

Bombs are carefully manufactured with waste products controlled, and products blowing up today's enemies coming to kill your kids. The demands placed on a local population are moderate and can be adjusted to.

AI center sucks up water and electricity (making it expensive to local neighborhood), pollutes area surrounding it, very quick to setup so neighborhoods have no time to adjust, and product is only marketable to people who are tired of using their brain. To a local neighborhood, it's a lot closer to "wtf are we getting out of this?"

[-] brachiosaurus@mander.xyz 6 points 22 hours ago

Bombs are carefully manufactured with waste products controlled, and products blowing up today’s enemies coming to kill your kids.

I would argue the war industry probably has less regulations than other businesses. In the US there are as many datacenters as military bases/arms factories.

[-] florencia@lemmy.blahaj.zone -2 points 21 hours ago

I would argue the war industry probably has less regulations than other businesses.

Got proof? Because I'm pretty sure military contractors have to explain themselves to senators and congresspeople that got them the contract if toxic waste leaks out of a "secure" facility.

Datacenters on the other hand are corporations using their own money/investments to grab land, congress/senators didn't ask them to.

[-] Commiejones@lemmygrad.ml 10 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

I’m pretty sure military contractors have to explain themselves to senators and congresspeople

the pentagon hasn't passed an audit in its entire history.

if toxic waste leaks out of a “secure” facility.

like nuclear waste

[-] Mangoholic@lemmy.ml 5 points 21 hours ago

And then they have to pay a 10 million fine, but discharging toxic waste saves them 100 million. Very accountable.

[-] florencia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 16 hours ago

Where is this 10 million fine story? I can't find it.

[-] notsosure@sh.itjust.works -5 points 20 hours ago

Because war /arms are useful?

[-] wuphysics87@lemmy.ml 2 points 20 hours ago

Have passed proof of concept lets say

[-] WalleyeWarrior@midwest.social -4 points 20 hours ago

I wouldn't say "useful" but the military industrial complex does at least employ actual people to create actual things, where as an AI data center just siphons off the resources of an area and creates no jobs. This is avoiding any moral judgement on weapons production, simply saying that the energy that goes into it is creating an actual product.

this post was submitted on 03 Feb 2026
87 points (93.1% liked)

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