> The issue is not so much what they do or that they exist, but how they are utilized

This is exactly how we got here though. Technology is not passive. It changes incentives, procedures, ideas and shapes the world. If we don't structurally limit what and how it's used, then we are not in control, no matter what are choices personally are.

A major problem is that if we structurally limit what technologies do, we are still not in control. Now whoever we empowered to control and limit the technology is in control. Who keeps them accountable?

You’ll probably get one of three outcomes: regulatory capture by monopolies, self dealing by bureaucrats to enrich themselves or gain power, or regulatory capture by self absorbed ideologues who halt all progress or force it down some ideologically approved path.

In none of those scenarios is anything aligned with the best interest of the people.

I hate to tell you this but nobody has ever been in control. To think you can is to think you can unring a bell.