Some of it might be you being a non-Southerner to an extent, but when I read "the deep Southern reverence for tradition is completely misguided because nothing there merits reverence," my first thought was "of course not, since you don't seem to understand that the 'tradition' refers to more than just archaic, antiquated customs and brutal laws." Faulkner's stories refer to the subtle hypocrisies of those who blindly accept the status quo or long to return to a semi-mythic past (as is stated quite strongly in Intruder in the Dust), but there is more to it than that. There is a tragic aspect to those moments of self-blindness, yet there is something more noble behind that; not everything from that past was utter garbage.

Some people might appreciate, while others might not. I view it akin to how I remember my great-aunt, who died at the age of 91 in 2000. She was clever, witty, and very vivacious; the true life of any party. Yet she didn't care too much for the "niggers" and as she slipped into a lonely, proud dementia her last few years, she changed to the point where I didn't care to be around here (I used to visit her at the shoe store where she worked into her late 70s; she calculated sales tax accurately in her head without needing to use the register). Should I remember only the worst (or best) aspects of her? Or would it be best to reflect the totality of it, to explore those tensions within that one person, and come to a greater understanding and appreciation of her character?

Faulkner does much the same with his fiction. Some might not like how he approaches telling those stories or how complex those Snopes and Griersons or McCaslins are, but he does display hope and aspiration as well as haunting self-despair in his stories. You just have to be more willing to open yourself up to digging into the stories to appreciate that.