Two very bizarre trends in how not to make a relevant point

After a few rounds of this recently I’m honestly starting to wonder if schools don’t teach children to read the damn question anymore. One of the basic things I was taught when it came to exams was that I ought to read the question as many times as I needed to make sure that I understood what it was asking, and if I wasn’t sure that I needed to ask an invidulator for help. I even recall being told to read the question at least twice slowly to make sure I understood what it was asking so that I didn’t make the mistake of answering what I thought was being asked only to discover much later, probably just before time ran out, that I’d misread the question and that the answer I’d given wouldn’t be applicable.

Alongside this I’ve also been recently coming across statements, usually of specific facts, that are entirely irrelevant to the discussion. They’re always complete non sequiturs though they usually have some casual relationship to what’s going on; the most recent example being equivalent to having a discussion about the character of Von Rothbart in Swan Lake and having someone interject with a list of places Swan Lake has been performed. Do people honestly think that sort of thing is relevant? Is it due to some burning urge to contribute with something, anything regardless of how tenuous a connection there is? Quality not quantity, children. If you throw up every line of text that features a key word, regardless of the context of said key word in each case, then nobody will ever be able to figure out what you’re actually saying.

I really have to wonder: has reading comprehension, the ability to sift data and being articulate gone out of fashion these days?