AMD (for that matter, any other processor manufacturer) isn’t off the hook either - eg. see “Platform Security Processor”. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_Platform_Security_Processor

They’ve been locking processors to individual motherboards and eliminating second-hand resale value for “enterprise” hardware in the name of “security” too: https://www.servethehome.com/amd-psb-vendor-locks-epyc-cpus-for-enhanced-security-at-a-cost/

You probably don’t deserve the downvotes for having spoken your mind, but you might want to be careful of what you wish for. My heart goes out to you for having to face the realities of your own life and conditions, but there is no silver bullet and no utopia to be had until some people are drawn to screw over others for whatever diminishing advantage they derive from their actions, while offloading (“externalizing”) the actual costs onto others and onto society at large.

I can see why you’d consider an all-powerful surveillance state as an option in your specific situation – but as a thought experiment on the same lines, would you consider moving to say China – where your wishes of total surveillance and absolute power are being implemented to the fullest extent possible – also, arguably to “preserve its society”? It has all the pulls of big city life…

Sadly, China itself is very likely on the path of forced breeding of its subjects to stabilize its population statistics (not its social fabric), from all the power and control they possess over their people, and from all the surveillance big data and analysis they’ve built for themselves. Would you want to be that unfortunate, unwilling parent, or even more unfortunate, that unwanted child, where your every step, every thought is logged and analyzed by machines, leading to actions and consequences pre-determined by a handful of all-powerful rulers?

This is probably the most extreme example there is, but all I’m saying is be careful of what you wish for…

AI has entered the chat

This is being made increasingly difficult every day, with huge corporations openly discussing the advantages of killing the open internet as it is today: https://github.com/RupertBenWiser/Web-Environment-Integrity/blob/main/README.md

The endgame seems to be to turn you into a mindless, agency-less zombie slave to these corps with your input being ads delivered to your (sub)conscious, and your output being you mindlessly doing whatever the ad wanted you to do. This is as much psychological – and social – divide-and-rule as it is technologically damaging, so even if you don’t know (or want) to run your own server, you will end up being affected, fractured and sharded against your own community all the same.

A sample case in point: It is getting more and more difficult to run your own servers when you are forbidden to spend your own money from your own electronic devices to pay for goods and services without being surveilled (and pounded by ads).

Most payment apps rely on device attestation “security”, that requires your mobile device be “compliant” to someone else’s rules, standards and endgames, to the effect that if you want to change your own bought-and-owned device in a way your ad-masters disapprove, you will be prevented from making payments from your device – and more significantly thereby, from participating in your community, economy and society unless you bend over to one of many private corporations that want you just as bent and broken as the rest of the people they already have.

This is pure, unadulterated evil at your doorstep, ringing your doorbell.

I know I probably sound far more pessimistic and hopeless than things actually are, but that is better than being asleep at the wheel. I do not wish to rob you of your optimism (I am actually happy that we still have it), but unless we see our world for what it really is today, it will be far more difficult to know and drive what it may become in the future.

Here is another example of how hard some people have worked to turn your own devices against you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7VwtOrwceo