This makes me think that one possible reason we havent observed any alien life is that similar to how we may avoid any sort of development or encroachment in an area containing an endangered species, we may have been marked off as too fragile to interact.

And humans are an incredibly fragile species from the perspective of a space faring civilization. If a meteor hits our planet, we are basically done. And even if that doesn't happen, we can only acquire raw materials and energy from our own planet, so we may basically just tap out all our resources before we learn to acquire it from somewhere else.

And then there is the fact that we love blowing each other up, which may not be a common trait amongst intelligent species.

> an bunch of endangered ants

As best as I can tell, there are no ant species on any endangered list, so this is a hyperbolic point.

(In general, we don't even study ant species enough to know whether they are endangered)

Theres a few species classified as endangered ants on the IUCN Red List.

However didn't aliens crush humanity to make space for a Intergalactic Super Highway in Hithchikers Guide to the Galaxy? We aren't even endangered according to those ruling fictional aliens who epitomise the "not interested in humanity" aspect.