"Instant" is a feature, not a bug.
The spec talks about "moving, blinking or scrolling information that (1) starts automatically, (2) lasts more than five seconds, and (3) is presented in parallel with other content"
It's relatively uncommon to encouter this as part of an app or actual legitimate content, but most sites that have ads would violate this spec. And I've noticed that I found those moving elements distracting enough that I just furiously closed a site and gave up on pursuing the information on it when I had the misfortune of encountering a news site on a PC without an ad blocker.
Of course I’m all for reducing animations, and not even only for accessibility reasons, but I don’t agree with calling all of them useless, when they do in fact have a very important role.
This feels like arguing that when we type, the computer should scribble each letter just as we would with a pen, or when a web page loads, it should slowly fill in like it did on dial-up. I want the computer to work as an extension of my brain; it should react as fast as I can think. I want it to show me something, and that thing simply appears as it would in the mind's eye.
These in-between states gives us well-needed information and are not artistic at all. Sure, they can be emulated badly, but for example iphone’s app switcher is imo a very natural implementation of how it should be done. Won’t make the action take any more time, but it does instruct on what happens very accurately. Compare it to i3’s instant desktop switching, which gives us barely any info to work with.