I don’t know about the specific theme you are using, but a while ago a member removed the acknowledgement from the theme they were using.
The entire theme broke.
The theme developer had two versions of the theme. One free - with the stipulation that the footer acknowledgement remain, the other paid - in which the footer acknowledgement was absent.
The free version had code in place so that if the footer acknowledgement was not there other critical functions of the theme would not work.
Can you really blame the theme author for wanting credit where credit is due?
My suggestion is that if you are not happy with the theme as it is to either contact the theme author about it or use a different theme that you are happy with.
Think of it this way. If a member posted something like this here.
I found a site that is a great source of cartoon images.
I can usually photoshop out the signature easy enough, but I need help removing the watermarks.
I do not want to pay for the high-quality watermark-free versions.
The free images will be fine for what I need, I just don’t want anyone to know where I got them from.
That wouldn’t bother you?