The current Slim PS5 also doesn’t have a disc drive, you can just buy it in a bundle and attach the optional one.
Honestly for manufacturing this makes way more sense, to ship one SKU and then make them all upgradable to disc. It’s also kind of nice that if you buy a digital one and want disc in the future you can just buy the drive.
I don’t even know why this is a question, people can absolutely be radicalized in a short period time, especially the apolitical. Even faster when large sums of money are involved.