I've had a similar experience. I think this loss of generalization is (dishearteningly) most visible in CS departments: many of my CS peers were openly scornful or disdainful of their liberal arts requirements, which in turn were diluted to ensure that mediocrity or inattention would not filter them out of their degrees. The end result: thousands of yearly graduates qualified to program (and by virtue bring money and renown back to the department), and nothing else.

Edit: And to be clear, these were not stupid people, and there is an important sense in which they were right to be scornful: the classes were clearly not intended to challenge them. I don't believe that particular blame can be levied on them.