You know, the Fermi Paradox doesn't seem paradoxical at all, when you aren't blinded by the illusion of linear progress and do not take civilization as a natural step in the evolution of a species.

Life evolves in the context of its planet, specific forms of it are even found only in the specific regions: polar bears live on Earth, but you won't find them in Africa, for example. And the vacuum of space is not the best place for life to flourish. In order for us to not fucking die in space and to be able to space travel in the first place – we need to extract so much resources from our planet, that ultimately this practice is just unsustainable.

So is it really surprising that we haven't found any signs of alien civilizations? Why would alien life, unless something went horribly wrong, develop any civilization with its ecocidal tendencies and strip-mining levels of resource extraction. I would presume that it is natural for life, having evolved on a planet, to live and die within and with its planet, its only true home. That this colonialist drive is just a human folly and not something that other intelligent life forms would necessarily share. And even if there were aliens that followed a similar path to us, had a civilization and set off to space – they would have very likely faced similar consequences: a planet that is incapable to sustain their ways of life and their interplanetary expeditions in particular. So, a space-faring civilization would probably not last very long.