I think there's truth to what you're saying but I also think there's truth to what people are experiencing and perceiving.

A highly power and/or water consumptive data center being installed in a town or city is pretty much a perfect embodiment of people's frustrations. It consumes tons of power and/or water and therefore drives up utility costs for the locals or pollutes the air with diesel exhaust. And it doesn't create jobs so it's just frankly some rich cabal of capitalists getting richer while people's lives continue to feel materially worse. I can't think of a better embodiment of the sort of confluence of crumminess that seems to be underway.