I didn’t realize this was an unpopular opinion

Neither have I.

This isn’t really an unpopular opinion, most scientists and astronomers agree with you. I don’t get this superstition / conspiracy theory either. E.g. no believable physical evidence has ever been put forward. The idea that “extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence” doesn’t seem to hold with some uneducated people; it’s like with the Loch Ness monster or with the Big Foot, pure make believe and lalaland stuff.

im going to downvote because I think this is the norm myself.

I dont think it is? Definitely not in the circles I run in, (work, social and family.) You may have just stumbled into a pod of simpletons. They congregate from time to time.

Chariots of the gods, man. They practically own South America. I mean, they taught the Incas everything they know.

I think this is more of a "want to believe" than a true belief. I hope.

I don't think it's a mainstream opinion that, for instance, the Egyptians needed alien intervention to learn how to put a brick on top of a brick until you formed a pyramid. But I guess I do know a lot of people who say that since there's no way to definitively know what's going on a million-billion lightyears away, they're open to the possibility.

But for the people who "the truth is out there" is religion, they're not going to let a little thing like evidence get in the way of their beliefs

My only, somewhat serious, disagreement is the signal comment. If they did send a signal and it's in a spectral band we monitor, we monitor a small percentage of the sky(low single digits) and even if it was from one of those areas, we've only been doing that for less than 100 years(probably closer to 50). If species sent a rf signal which arrived here during the French revolution we would never of noticed.

Put down the crackpipe and turn on the TV. There is a history channel documentary proving that they have. Its called "the proof is out there".