Hopefully I don't offend the site devs with this topic - as it is an original and distinct feature here. But.. hear me out.

The lightning animation is a confusing and distracting feature (ducks for shelter, "please be kind.") Particularly for new users, who have no idea why the interruptions keep occurring, let-alone what it means or signifies. Forcing those who are annoyed by it to discover what is causing the distraction, and hopefully finding the small toggle button at the bottom of the page. At this point, I would hope the user is interested enough in the site, and conversation to dig into it - rather than leaving the site. Also, in the near future when Zaps happen every 1 second; no reading will be possible!

I have also experienced an actual issue with this feature, many months ago. I visited the site from a minimal-CPU device with an equally poor video card. I would not SEE the animation; but the site would randomly hang/freeze on this device for ~3 seconds. Because I had previously visited on other devices, I was able to figure out relatively quickly these freezes were likely caused by the lightning animation - and disabled it. Solving the hang/freeze issue on that device. To a first time user, with a crappy video card - this could be a quick end.

Personally I'd prefer to have the animation only occupy the title bar area, have an easy (?) icon, and the ⚡ disable button nearby. Maybe have JS track the animation latency; and auto-disable on weak devices.