You should be more careful with such statements. Boldly claiming that something is 'false' and backing it up with a rather vague hypotheticals does not make your statement look good, considering that said hypotheticals are not supported by my own chess playing experience. Of course, I don't claim to be a really strong player or something, and my lichess rapid rating is only ~2580, so maybe your expertize in these matters exceeds mine.
I don't think so. I only started playing online a couple of years ago to relax, but ~30 years ago I used to go to chess school for a few years and had a First class sportsman degree [0], and even barely qualified for a Candidate for Master of Sport after a couple of local tournaments, but it wasn't awarded to me because I simply stopped appearing: it coincided with me losing interest in chess as time limits on that level grew to ~2+ hours and that was far too much for my jumpy ass. So I don't think that First class title is still active, as even the country that awarded it to me - USSR - doesn't exist any more.
