First of all, not only translators are upset by this 'revamp', community members are also unsatisfied. I'll try to share my and others point of view to show you (and
@Fesa, as they've posted that question on their profile) why everyone is that upset, besides the rank / privileges they lost.
Also, I want to state, there were hundreds of people without a rank that worked on translations as well. They aren't happy with this change either. That voids the point you stated in the first place.
For my second point you'll have to understand the people that worked as a translator. They've been in the same team for many years. They worked voluntary, worked hard and delivered quality work. They've been a family as a team, probably the closest team across the network. All out of nowhere, the team gets dropped. No discussions, no consultation with the team, no communication at all. I could get that the TT is angry only because of that.
But, that's not even everything. Many of the TT members haven't played CubeCraft too often. Either they didn't enjoy it too much or they had other things to do with their time, I can't tell you. What I can tell is that those people were an important part in the community. When I joined a conversation in the Discord server, it was odd if I didn't see a red name. These people have been here for quite some time, and now, as they don't really play on CubeCraft that actively, they have nothing to stay in the community for. This won't only be a loss for the Staff Team, but also a loss for the community: something fairly valuable in these tough times for Minecraft servers in general.
Then lastly we have their Staff position. Now this sounds similar to what you mentioned, but the point I want to make is quite different. Theoretically, Translation Team was already "merged with the community", as all TT members were volunteers for the network. They went through an application process and were moderated on their work, so that the quality remained of high level. As you see, this job was pretty wanted around the community: it was an 'easy accessible' staff role, a great way to do something back for CubeCraft after all they gave them. Because it was a wanted job, there would always be applications for the team. The team could select the best of the best, the 'crème de la crème', and thus retain motivation and activity. The current situation is much different: Less people will know about the existence of this new translation program (no more server-wide messages online, no more applications, no more people advertising to join because of the staff position), the general quality of translations will be lower (every 12yo can submit strings if they wish), as well as the pressure on proofreaders will be higher (they'll basically become the translation team, as they have to filter and change all the nonsense translations that will be submitted). In addition, there won't be any internal communication, nor internal feedback between experienced translators. I personally believe communication was already a problem within CubeCraft (this 'revamp' is a perfect example of that), so that's definitely not an improvement
Not to forget, on top of all these bigger issues, you also have anger about ranks and privileges, but that was for a small elite only anyways.
Concluding, I don't see how this program will be beneficial for CubeCraft at all. They destructed an important part of the community without even discussing that with them, put a ton of pressure on the remaining part of the team, they removed all requirements for becoming a translator and they made it not rewarding at all, which will take away motivation from everyone that ever wanted to be part of the team.
Very curious how this will turn out in the future. And to answer the question: even though their work isn't voided, I feel like the prestige of the function is, as well as the family the team formed, which is enough reason for many people to be upset.