Everyone likes "their" Fascist...

Why are nationalism and patriotism dangerous? Well - because they cause people to act irrationally. In my book anything that makes people irrational is in fact bad. I notice this danger most when discussing historical leaders with people from many different countries. I have written about this before in relation to irrationality, but I have never identified the root of the problem which lies in patriotism and nationalism (both forms of religion worshipping the State). The motto of these people is "well, he made out country great". For example if anyone in the Western World was asked if they admire Stalin, I doubt he would get more than a 1% positive approval rating. Meanwhile in Russia he was chosen the 3rd greatest ever Russian hero! By any objective standard Abraham Lincoln would be considered a tyrant (Hitler was a big admirer...), but in the United States he gets high praise from people blinded by patriotism. Similarly I have met a lot of Italians who speak positively of Mussolini and there are still plenty of Francoists in Spain (putting aside the fact Franco was much better a man and leader than the previous three I named). This phenomenon is like i say - a religion. Basing actions on any relogious faith-base is totally against rationality in any way, shape, or form.
This religion also has its rites and practices, of course. One symptom in the United States is the "national greatness conservatism" movemement composed mainly of NeoCons like John R. Bolton and John McCain. These are the sort of people who like to build giant monuments to their God-like heroes (anyone who has been to the Greek temple known as the Lincoln Memorian knows this). Hero-worship is a very primitive custom which existed in ancient Greece and Rome - it has no place in modern society. Having a role-model in life has nothing to do with worshipping and building statues.

The great Christian-Anarchist Leo Tolstoy once described this relation of statism, dominance, and patriotist in these words: "Patriotism ... for rulers is nothing else than a tool for achieving their power-hungry and money-hungry goals, and for the ruled it means renouncing their human dignity, reason, conscience, and slavish submission to those in power. ... Patriotism is slavery."