standard approach with such a controversial feature

The “controversial” features:

1. Alt-text generation: Creates descriptions for images, which is particularly useful for making PDFs more accessible to screen readers.
2. On-device translation: Translates web pages without sending your content to external servers, protecting your privacy.
3. Smart tab groups: Analyzes open tabs to suggest names and group similar ones together to help with organization.
4. Link previews: Generates key points from articles to give you a quick summary.

These are all very modest in requirements even on an old phone. And the use is actually zero unless you use the function.
AFAIK all further AI functionalities are all optional.

Number one is particularly useful for blind people, a group that absolutely needs screen readers to work well.

So again stop the bullshitting, just because you are bullshitting yourself too doesn’t make it better.
Either that or mention just one single specific function you “needed” to disable and why.
IMO your misunderstood whining is annoying.

Personally I use the translation function a lot, it is both very handy and very good, and I have used it for both Russian and Ukrainian and Chinese, and it works surprisingly well.
But maybe you speak every language on the planet, or find it more convenient to use an online translator, leaving unnecessary extra digital trails and requiring extra bandwidth?
How you don’t find that feature useful is beyond me???