I get a lot of random recruiter pings, probably mostly because I don't bother to do anything to proactively limit them (and I tend to use my real name on forums, social networks, etc and will often post my real gmail address and such).
But for me it doesn't seem like they are that big of a deal and the vast majority of them I just completely ignore. If somebody emails me out of the blue unprompted, I don't feel guilty about archiving their message away without a response. And practically speaking, given the shotgun nature that most of these emails come in on, the recruiter isn't even going to notice that I didn't respond, let alone feel slighted by it.
Getting about an average of one easily-ignorable email per day trying to let you know about an open job opportunity in your field is truly a high level first world problem... one that a lot of people living in the first world in other professions would likely be very happy to have.
But for me it doesn't seem like they are that big of a deal and the vast majority of them I just completely ignore. If somebody emails me out of the blue unprompted, I don't feel guilty about archiving their message away without a response. And practically speaking, given the shotgun nature that most of these emails come in on, the recruiter isn't even going to notice that I didn't respond, let alone feel slighted by it.
Getting about an average of one easily-ignorable email per day trying to let you know about an open job opportunity in your field is truly a high level first world problem... one that a lot of people living in the first world in other professions would likely be very happy to have.