The Corvette generations you mentioned have a "smart" SRS airbag system. It can detect passenger seat occupancy and if it's less than 80 lbs, the passenger-side module is turned off. Also, since a car seat straddles the occupancy sensor (located in the middle of cushion), the module is turned off anyway. The problem lies within the fact of mixing rear-facing car seat with a deploying front airbag; remove one aspect of the equation and the problem no longer exists.
I drove around my then-toddler son in my '3 Z06 with passenger-side airbag manually turned off. My '8 Z06 already has the the passenger occupancy sensor, so no action is needed.