Besides that, one can often make useful inferences from what things a person chooses to romanticize and what historical figures or causes they portray as heroic or worthy of emulation.
I don't know about that, in many things I would really want at least a little more data.
I am put off by both the Confederacy romanticizing of both fiction that whitewashes the Confederacy by making them not really about slavery (I believe the Deadlands version has them naturally move past slavery and give it up on their own and Firefly's Browncoats are very space Confederacy versus space Union but without slavery being a thing at all) but also with the Wheel of Time's Seanchan who are sort of a glorified mythic fantasy Confederacy who are slavers and brilliant military people and administrators and full of honor and the results of their conquering and enslaving people is portrayed as an overall positive thing.
I loved the Dukes of Hazard TV show as a young kid. It was an action show about Robin Hood type good old country boys pulling fast ones on dirty cops and corrupt local government officials. I would play Bo and my brother would play Luke. I had no real context for the Confederate flag on the car named the General Lee that played Dixie as its horn when I watched it. Looking back on it now with context for the Confederate flag and General Lee and Dixie and the whole history and context of glorifying and whitewashing of the Confederacy and the ongoing effects of the Confederacy it is quite disheartening and distasteful.
On the other hand I have romanticized vikings since I was a little kid and read Daulaire's Norse Myths and Thor comics (and I loved the art for the Norse Gods in the 1e Deities and Demigods). I often play good guy viking characters in D&D who fight evil and have nothing to do with slavery (I have played pirates who raid evil slaver empire stuff and freed the slaves). Even after learning about historical viking slave raiding and slave trade stuff, and modern White supremacist movements associating themselves with viking stuff, I continue to play fairly mythical viking hero types and enjoy viking history and myths and fiction. This could be viewed as me whitewashing the cruelty and slave taking elements of actual viking history or the current white supremacist stuff. I have a friend in my gaming group who thinks it is a bit dissonant for me to play good guy viking characters and for me to be into viking stuff.
There are people who romanticize viking stuff because of the White supremacy angles or such. There are also a ton though who are into viking stuff because of Marvel movies and such.
As for inferences, even with things like Deadlands, I do not know enough about the authors or the actual specifics of the lore to say whether it was a conscious whitewashing of the Confederacy, or just was an effort to come up with stuff for a Weird West alt history game world that ended up with implications from their choices. I could see different author motivations leading to some similar end points. My Deadlands knowledge is mostly on the Western end though and the gunslinging Weird West and critter elements I found fun. I have not played in a game or fully read any of the books. More specifics of the lore, which may be out there in stuff like
the Back East: The South sourcebook or even in the corebooks, could certainly push more one way than the other, particularly in glorifying specific people or ideas.
