I agree with you PACE but the modern thinking seems is to teach people to drive the aircraft to a set of rules which will be punishable if you break them. Ifthey arn't written down rules the double edged sword of "airmanship" is used to try and bludger pilots into doing some right bizarre crap. Usually with the beating stick of "safety" used. Quite alot of cases it not being safety its just the dumbing down of the majority to protect the talent limited minority who shouldn't be PIC of an aircraft.
There are more and more instructors coming on the scene that have been trained with the mind set they will go straight to a multi crew cockpit and have been trained to fly as light aircraft as if its a heavy. The whole concept of being a pilot is alien to them. They are operators not pilots, taking the autopilot out is terrible airmanship. And to be honest it proberly is with there level of handling skills.