A friend of mine had a thread that included some thoughts on the impact removing music education has had

A friend of mine had a thread that included some thoughts on the impact removing music education has had on the greater collapse of our musical culture and the growing perception of a “talent vacuum” in the music industry. I had to add my three flippant cents:
“We do have artists “like this” today-most of them “die on the vine” and their corpses litter the local scene. In the cultural desert of Wal-Mart, and Disney, and reality T.V., most talent is consigned to death by indifference. By the time this trifecta of balderdash has finished turning the screws on us, we-broadly speaking-put such a premium on whatever hustle that’s been perpetrated that we can no longer, cultural speaking, distinguish between the sh*t and the shinola. So, while the Kardashians of the world are rolling in the grease and working on their endless star-spangled shuck and jive, talent howls at the moon and eats bugs just for the “privilege” of being able to hone its craft. It’s not just music that has been sacrificed on the altar of educational expedience-it’s any and all emphasis on critical thinking. And when people stop learning how to think critically you get Kanye West and Honey Boo-Boo and George W. Bush…and the madhouse, then, seems like a pretty decent sitio for the wretched and the thoughtful… so, bye-bye Miss American Pie.”