Where Is The Good Grammar? Do writing Standards Matter Any More?

In English class at a homosexually charged 'grammar' school..

I was taught not to insert a comma before a ‘but’ or an ‘and’...
Also, I was taught to write 'he was neat and tidy. Regularly cleaning..' instead of 'he was neat, tidy. Regularly clea...'

Yet still, I see paid writers/ journalists/ cheekys doing things like this all the time. The editors condone it...

I understand that the English language is changing but aren't these guys supposed to be setting the example for others to follow. I get it now, they've been set examples by wrong-uns and their peers are not properly trained.

"With the Americans using Z's instead of S', what a way to bastardize..."

Is it that they have been taught English by people who are only vaguely familiar with it?
Have these writers learned from those who don't know how English is supposed to be written?
Could that be so?

If these practices are acceptable, why refuse to hire someone without a degree. (Look at Charlie Brooker’s biography)

“So that was Music and Video Exchange, and a guy ended up going off to set up CEX so I was working there – I did some comic strip adverts for them, because when they found out I was a cartoonist they’d get me to do cartoons for them. And they’d appear in various magazines, and one of them was PC Zone which was based round the corner.

“One day it was Patrick McCarthy – David McCandless would pop in – but no Patrick McCarthy wanted to know if I was interested in doing some comic strips for the magazine and so I went to chat with them. Macca said to me, ‘Why don’t you write a review?’ And my reaction was ‘I don’t think I’m qualified to do that.’ Like you needed a special qualification! I had a PC and… it was around the era of Alone In The Dark – I remember going there and seeing an early beta of Doom and thinking ‘God this changes everything: THE GUN BOBS AROUND. IT BOBS ABOUT A BIT’. And having a networked game of Doom.” What was your first review? “…I think the first review I had published was Fallout.”

“I was working at PC Zone and someone was doing a show at Radio One called The Digital Update with Dave Green [who now helps run BAFTA games] – he was co-hosting. And he was leaving. He did an item on these prank calls I’d done. And then he was leaving and then I replaced him. And then I was doing that and then they did a TV spin-off of it on BBC Knowledge. So that was how I started getting into television.”

If being educated formally leaves one writing as an ‘untrained amateur’ could, what is the worth and difference of a degree?

So that you have a higher chance of being trusted without nepotism and can be seen to have exercised one of the sorts of dedication?

An awful article by Mrs Degree will get more respect, recognition and have more provisioned worth than a great article written by Mr Passion.