>Then why are the values and customs of traditional societies typically
>so quickly obliterated when these societies come into contact with
>advanced technologies, even if there is substantial resistance to such
>cultural pollution?
People often talk about technology as if its development and adoption weren't driven by money and competitive capitalist markets. For conservative critics of capitalist society, who often speak of "globalization" and "technology" and the "destruction of tradition" instead, innovation and internationalization are treated as evils in themselves. It just struck me that one reason for this is that they're not offended by the social hierarchies of capitalism themselves, but just the turbulent bits, which often disturb those hierarchies.
I won't get into the framing of "the values and customs of traditional societies" as an unexamined good.
Doug