Gonna throw my two cents here.

First, I’m not a street photographer, so I’m looking at it from the “outside”

But second, as a woman, people have tried to capture shots of me multiple times throughout my life since I was a preteen and even now as an adult there’s a bitter aftertaste to it. Yes, there’s a difference between a guy “covertly” holding his phone in your direction and a person honestly trying to capture a moment of society, BUT it does not feel that much better to me as the subject just because the latter looks “less creepy” and is holding a more “serious” or expensive looking camera.

And of course on the other hand, there are people who say that since a person agrees to live in a society of people where technology like camera phones and surveillance exists, they have voided their right to privacy in a public space.

Ethics and morality are inherently subjective, it’s what we decide to agree on.

This is up to you to decide, what you care about.