It's weird how long-past incidental things have been codified as traditional norms, which everyone was expected to follow in order to earn 'credentials'. One example: musical notation.

Modern music production software often uses much more intuitive and easy to follow methods of visualizing music. Outdated notation is extremely difficult to learn because it was developed as a highly compact way representing notes in time, *for the time*. On paper, it was efficient. They didn't have graphics to make it easier on the eye and less confusing. As everyone who has contemplated being a professional musician through classical training knows, who decided it was just too much rigor and the notation was too hard to drill in the brain, there was just a visceral feeling that the notation was *wrong* and the rigor not right for musical brains.

There are reasons for it. Cognitively, musical notation and the classical structure of drill and training are off-putting (even viscerally painful) for most musical brains. Fortunately that is now moot because of better visualization formats that are software-based. The only issue is, do schools allow alternative visualizations in lieu of traditional notation? Or do they penalize those who cannot handle the archaic formatting?

Another example: the national anthem, written by a slave-owner who gloried in war, and various other cynically employed rituals of patriotism, . Do those who cannot conscionably display reverence for the ritual (which to the mainstream emotionally symbolizes unity and victory but has so much blood-tainted history in light of the fourth dimension) deserve to be hurdled by mass stigma, death threats or intimidation through loss of income?

So many hurdles, so little time.