a chapel of ease

f1 has gotten SO popular since 2018, and most fan accounts posting now would not have watched nico race. hell, i watched him when i was a kid, but i have patchy memories of that. peoples only perception of nico is when he attends races and the occasional podcast clip. his old races, written media, social media, etc, are buried in our niche retired drivers community. of course, people are quite limited on what they see of him, that's just natural with the sport moving on to our current drivers. the result of this is that they’re getting the 41 year old, retired for a decade, girldad, venture capitalist nico who is a lot more open about his mental health, vulnerability, etc, compared to him back then.

lewis now has a very 'untouchable' status around him. i have seen fans come into the sport in the last year and kind of dismiss being a lewis fan - he's an older guy to support, he's already won, he's not constantly posting like some of the younger guys. fans of his know that he does post - a lot! the guy has always been quite online, but he isn't streaming, vlogging, pr challenges constantly like other drivers. ‘fandom’ wise, 41 year old lewis isn’t very easy for people to read into, so fans will put a perception on him that he’s distant - this isn’t helped by how he doesn’t play into duo relationships like the rest of them. he has people who he likes on the grid, but he doesn’t engage with the pr friendships and this makes him feel much more isolated, and by proxy have a semi-isolated community, compared to other drivers.

which is mental because their public perceptions used to be the exact opposite!! much of that was incredibly seeped with racism against lewis, but he was seen as the 'emotional' one who lashed out, compared to the 'level headed' nico.

(the telegraph, from 2014, sidenote this article is slightly infamous and absolutely vitriol against lewis, which was then used against lewis into 2015)

(1st article headline, 2nd article headline)

nico, on the other hand, had a lot less support overall and was seen almost how people view george now - pr trained, robotic.

(cnn, 2015)

lewis did/does have the much larger fanbase, so nico was viewed fanbase wise as annoying, forcing the team to bend orders for him, etc (basically the same things which solo44s say now, which i can respectfully disagree with, but appreciate that nothing has changed in 12+ years lol)

(i did not screenshot comments due to privacy, but these are replies on one (1) post about nico from mercedes’ facebook in 2015. i promise there was much more across posts from that year.) 

Team orders and all that! Let little Nico win as Lewis has won the title already! Bitter loser.  He only smiles when he wins. The only negative aspect of the Mercedes team is Nico Rosberg. The guy is a very poor sportsman and just a complete jerk. Nico's father Keke Rosberg was hardly a great Formula One driver, however, there are no records of Keke Rosberg ever behaving like the spoilt robotic brat he appears to have nurtured.  What the fuck is this sudden marketing campaign for Nico to be seen as a nice, smiley guy?

nico being disliked because he was too cold, lewis disliked because he was too emotional - that was always the narrative ran against both of them. but now lewis is the one separate from the grid, and treated ‘different’ by the wider fandom, and nico has become open about his thoughts post-retirement, which has created the perception that lewis is the one “at fault” for brocedes and that he must be haunted by nico? that lewis’ big wish is that he could be more “apologise to nico for the past”? that anything vaguely to do with monaco, germany, blonde things, comments about the past friendships, old races, etc automatically have to do with nico? 

nico, who clearly must be yearning for the past, but lewis is the one who is clawing away from his feelings around nico. or maybe they’re just 41 year olds with completely different lives and they no longer fit into each other's orbit. this isn’t me talking about the community making works about them, it’s people that try to genuinely connect all of their entire present lives to one another. people choose to engage with lewis in this fandom practically only through nico - a guy they don't care about to being with / know / have only engaged with through other fandom interactions. this isn't me saying you need to have a written exam to pass to 'understand' brocedes or some nonsense, it's just that i’m tired of people, in a fandom way, only feeling like they can discuss one with the other one. if lewis was a white guy, would he still be viewed as so 'other' in the fandom, or would he only be different due to his massive success? would he then be included by the wider community, or would it still revolve around the other white people in his life?