Landscape, patriotism and the spectre of nationalism

Over  the years I have shared alot of my paintings on Facebook and many people have commented on how much they like them. However I have noticed that those people I know who hold extreme views about subjects like immigration tend to be drawn to the more sentimental works. This caused me some confusion, why did people who seemed to be defined, at least in part by what or who they hate feel so drawn to sentimentality? This question was at least in part why I chose to discuss Nazi art in two of my written reports.
The key to answering this question is in understanding nationalism, which is at its heart a sentimental often delusional understanding of history, what I mean by this is that in the Nationalists mind there was always a golden age. A time where everything was perfect, and happy. This latter half of the Nationalist narrative goes some way to explaining why people who sympathize with Nationalism's racist framing of immigration might enjoy pretty pictures of lovely landscapes that they can identify as home. Many impressionist works feature only white people in pastoral scenes so the nationalist narrative of a racially homogeneous past can be supported by such images.
There is nothing in representational art that challenges them or that could promote disquiet as there often is in expressionist works. Many Expressionists were trying to explore the subconscious and that is not an area where many nationalists want to go. Sentimental art is safe, it demands nothing and can be interpreted in a way as to reinforce prejudices and that I think is why many of those who sympathise with a nationalist agenda are drawn to it. Equally, expressionism, particularly abstract expressionism threatens them because it asks them to think about their responses.
Conceptual works also often provoke extreme anger among conservatives, again I would argue that this is because it often is intended to provoke or challenge the viewers subconscious mind.
For many conservatives this is a problem because their subconscious minds are often unsafe frightening places to be. The people I know who hold extreme nationalist views all have some sort of underlying mental health issue, their common denominator is fear.
Fearful people do and support stupid things.