my two cents about the fanfic discourse.
take it from someone old who has been writing fanfics for almost 2 decades now.
short take: Don't lose your sleep over it.
the thing with fanfic in general but especially RPF is that the moment you make it public by sharing it on the internet, you lose control of who might see it.
while Ferrari is cringe for showing RPF summaries to the drivers, it is just something that you now know it happened.
Lewis or any other driver could have very well googled their name, and fanfics would show up anyway.
to everyone who writes fics for the drivers (including the gay stuff) should not feel bad about it, because it wasn't you who broke the fandom rules, it wasn't you who went up to the driver and gave him the fic. The fandom rule is we ourselves do not do that. We can't control the doings of people outside the fandom, so don't feel guilty about it.
Now, Lewis and every other driver are grown adults, and they can make an informed decision. They can ignore the fics and go about their lives, they can proceed and read the smuttiest smut of them railing each other, and 1. enjoy it and continue to read, 2. not enjoy it and stop reading.
and if they don't want to see that again they can set boundaries and say "please don't show me this again ever, I don't want to know"
here's an example from an actor of one of my favourite game characters. Fans kept on asking them if they have seen the fanfics. The actor was very clear with their boundaries: "I'm aware, I don't mind it existing, I don't want to see it, and please don't involve my real person in your fics"
They didnt even want to see fics of their character and set a boundary for rpf too.
So in the case of Lewis, he said he was interested to read, so let him do it, he can make an informed decision once he knows what it is.
Now for the negative side and why fanfic has escaped fandom spaces.
this is not new, and it happened gradually, when social media became a thing, and some "authors" felt so mighty that they started linking their fics and tagging the original creators or actors of the characters they shipped. (I'm not even talking about RPF) sadly the need of some to get fame created a massive problem for fandom spaces, as artists of the originals reacted sometimes negatively to the existence of fanfics. then broader media found out, and it was over from then on. Fanfic is something now known to general public, and not something fandom space specific.
Ferrari and whoever was behind all that, simply jumped into a bandwagon that they don't understand at all, and what we have fought for to protect.
bottom line, keep on writing your fics, the drivers are adults and can make informed decisions to not click on them and read them.
