Clearly you know of lot about this.

Nah, that is the problem. It all got so dynamic and easy I don't really know how the hundreds of active modules on my desktop are loaded, why or in what order anymore. The days when I could list a handful of modules to load at boot are long gone I think unless its an embedded device or perhaps a simple server.

Setting modules_disabled might be viable for a relatively static system. I have seen that one when looking at hardening servers in the past but thought it was a bit extreme. Perhaps not.