the dragon bit's a myth I grant you, as for the man himself the Catholic Church canonises human beings not myths, and I'm fine with the right type of nationalism when it's about the actual population, like the way Australians are patriotic, and not some propagandising set of icons or nostalgia for Empire, actually I do prefer countires like Belgium, Denmark, Portugal or Canada who are proud of their countries but don't think they're a race apart like some places ... don't Rangers fans say 'We are the People' - French, Americans, Russians, Poles, Brits can have this superior pride, while other nationalities are less afflicted - I've got Czech heritage - Velvet Revolution and Divorce, one death in all that commotion and they reckon that was a set up, compare that to what used to be Yugoslavia, I prefer my nationalism lite.

I'm not quite sure why you put Belgium, Denmark or Portugal. Portugal's Empire purposefully killed tens of millions of people and they are fiercely nationalist - particularly when it comes to Spain.
Denmark had a huge Empire that tried to rival Britain but got itself beaten by Nelson in the end - again their nationalism is mainly in regards to their neighbours but they are also very celebrating of the Vikings.
The funniest one you put is Belgium, dogged with problems of ethnicity and voting for Nationalist, even Nazi, political parties that were not acceptable to the EU and hence never took power. Plus again, tens of millions enslaved and killed in their invented country of the Congo in Africa - in which they are still involved.
Canada are mainly nationalist against their neighbours - the USA. Yet, they too suffer problems with ethnicity. There are the French Canadians and the British Canadians and they like each other about as much as the English like the French.
So these are perhaps not killing each other but are proud to be nationalist - except Trudeau who is the joke of the world and will not be voted in next time. And yes, I will put money on it.

The Nationalism of the Balkan states is interesting but you have perhaps leaped too far. There was a Yugoslavian nationalism under Tito, and of course, an authoritarian state. That was what it took to keep down the ethnic violence within the state. I'm not sure you will be advocating for that.

You put Britain - is the nationalism not more English, Welsh, Scottish, Irish etc.? Ask any Scot or Welshman about English people and what answer do you think you will get? It always seems fine to harp on about being Scottish or Welsh but apparently not ok to be proud about being English.

I wonder if the pattern is - if your country was weak and dominated by others then your patriotism is fine; if your country achieved things by dominating other countries let's now be ashamed. Which is not helping anyone.
Look at the constant ridicule of the USA - is it really warranted? They are our ally - whether you like it or not. China has invaded plenty of countries but that is all fine. Nobody even seems to know anything about it. No way will we take the p1ss out of the Chinese - afraid to be racist? Who can tell.

Hence the pilgrim fathers was chosen to represent the founding of America yet they were not the first settlers nor did they do much in the way of creating a country. However they did not keep slaves and were fairly benign and so were acceptable, and a legend is born.

The real founding fathers of America were those involved in the slave trade or as Malcom X put it:

"We didn't land on Plymouth Rock, Plymouth Rock landed on us."

A good and interesting post. Just to pick up on one detail...Portugal killed TENS of millions. Is that right?

Ask the Native South Americans. People always blame Spain, yet Portugal got their spoils from the Pope.