You can't realistically expect that there will always be someone up the ladder to explain things to you. I mean, who explains stuff to the professors if it worked like that?
Yes, you have to shed the expectation that others will teach you, I agree with that. In the end, people slogged through by doing a bunch of reading from various sources. It is maybe the main lesson of university for everyone: you're not in high school anymore, you won't just learn whatever the guy says while talking to you. It's quite the shock if you had actually good teachers at school.
The thing is though, you can still demand good teaching materials. Textbooks have to explain things in the clearest way possible. They shouldn't be confusing, especially considering they end up being the main source for just about everything. In this modern world where there are online lectures and textbooks, there's no reason we can't all have the very best explanations of every relevant concept. Yes, of course as a student you still have to put in the time, but the materials ought to be the very best.
Even at the research level we are not independent islands of learning and discovery. People collaborate, some pickup certain concepts better than others and vice versa. So we teach and aid each other.
It seems you're firmly against this notion? Or if not please clarify your position?
I think everyone should be capable of working alone as well, and that has been the general assumption around as far as I've noticed. Of course collaboration is usually way more productive and also unavoidable.
But we were talking about education. Theses are individual for a reason.