Addressing your point directly, is pop music a good thing? Well, is music a good thing? I think yes. What makes pop music different from non-pop music? Probably something about ease of consumption. Does ease of consumption effect what makes music good? Possibly to a degree. I think its fair to say that pop music is more disposable, and also far less likely to challenge the listener - and that sometimes challenge is good.

That said, it still brings all sorts of benefits of music, and the sheer popularity of pop music makes the shared experience so much broader and possibly more powerful. So in balance, maybe pop music isn't -the best- type of music for people to listen to. But I don't really think it's -bad-. We can't really expect for everyone to wish to be challenged in all their activities and all the experiences they consume.