The massive build-out of data centers recently has aroused the wrath of the American public across the political spectrum. However, this backlash has highlighted a sharp disconnect in modern society: On the one hand, we expect technology to provide us with an on-demand, 21st-century digital lifestyle, but on the other, we eschew the infrastructure required to provide us with the means to implement our way of life.
The enormous scale of the newest data centers is difficult to comprehend. The largest data center for Meta (Facebook) in Oregon presently comprises 4.6 million square feet across 11 connected buildings.
But that is nothing compared to Meta’s new center in Louisiana that will cover 3,650 acres (about six square miles), a footprint that is almost four times the size of New York City’s Central Park.
The environmental impact of data centers is significant: They require huge amounts of water for cooling; most have their own generators that rely either on their own natural gas turbines or the electric grid (often with diesel generators for back-up) that contribute to air pollution; and the industrial cooling systems and rooftop fans create a constant level of noise.
However, using Meta as an example, hundreds of millions of Americans use Meta’s platforms — Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp — not merely daily, but on a constant basis, 24/7.
Americans also rely on the other companies with huge data centers, most notably Amazon for our shopping and Alphabet (which owns Google and YouTube) for our information and entertainment.
To be sure, the trillion-dollar tech firms building these data centers must be required to do more to reduce their impact on local communities and the environment.
But in the end, we have to admit a basic truth: Data centers exist because of our insatiable need and desire to click…click.. click…
The legacy of Gloria Steinem
When Gloria Steinem was born in 1934, the United States was 158 years old — but women had gained the right to vote only 14 years earlier in 1920. When Ms. Steinem graduated from Smith College in 1956, it would be 18 more years before women were able to obtain a credit card in their own name.
Speaking before the National Women’s Political Caucus, of which she was a co-founder in 1971, Steinem said of the women’s movement, “This is no simple reform. It really is a revolution.”
The changes that Gloria Steinem and her fellow trailblazing women brought about truly have proven to be revolutionary. In the 1950s, a woman in the fields of medicine, the sciences, finance, or the law was an anomaly, as was depicted in the recent Apple TV show Lessons in Chemistry starring Brie Larson.
Fast forward 60 years, and women today are in the majority in law schools and medical schools in the United States. Far more women obtain college degrees than men, and are more likely to do so in four years.
Regular viewers of the financial news networks such as CNBC and Bloomberg every day see as many women as men explain to viewers what’s going on in the world of finance. Thirty years ago, there were barely any women on financial news shows.
Thanks to the tireless efforts of Gloria Steinem spanning decades, women today can aspire to have a life beyond the role of, “Barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen” that was expected of women when Gloria Steinem undertook her revolution.
In the late 1960s, a new cigarette brand, Virginia Slims, made a direct appeal to women smokers with the tagline, “You’ve Come a Long Way Baby.” While it certainly is true that women have “come a long way” in the past 50 years since the misogynistic era of the 1960s depicted in the TV show Mad Men, Gloria Steinem realized that the goal of achieving full equality between men and women still has a long way to go: The longstanding issues of unequal pay, sexual harassment in the workpace, and domestic violence in the home still plague our society.
Gloria Steinem never gave up the fight. Even at the age of 92, she was a forceful voice on behalf of the values to which she dedicated her life. Ms.Steinem’s presence will be missed by all of us who recognize that women’s rights are human rights — and that the revolution still is ongoing in 2026.