RaggedMan wrote:
It's okay to have a favorite driver/team/country that you root for, but some people become so personally invested that having something said about that driver/team/country is perceived as an attack against them.
These are the people who talk about how "we" are going to win the title this year, or how the refs screwed "us."
Interesting article that I read this morning talks about much the same thing only with the emphasis being on politics. But the main point applies to this as well.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/5/18/15659394/trump-supporters-motivated-ignoranceGood article. It does seem that many have a difficult time(in general, in life), to change their opinion on something they believed for a long time, especially when you have so many others who believe the same. It really is all about fitting in, in particular groups. Whether it's a football team, a political party, a singer, driver, religion or whatever. It really is very convenient to tune out everything you don't want to hear. The more invested/fanatical you are, the more difficult it is to reason properly. And it doesn't have to mean you are not intelligent for doing this, you just choose to ignore anything that goes against your views. And like it says in the article, choosing to only read and hear things that reinforce your beliefs instead of taking all facts in to account makes you feel better.
It is as if whatever you chose to believe in from the start has to be right. If someone tells you later it isn't then it becomes like you say, an attack on yourself. It is really an attack on your judgement, it means you made the wrong decision on such an important thing and some feel it's more important to preserve their ego then to admitt they might have been wrong, even though they know a change would benefit them.
You can apply this to relationships for example. You choose to hang on to this positive side of your partner that you saw in the beggining despite the person showing more and more who they really are later. And everyone around you could be telling you to get rid of this person but you who have invested a lot of time and effort in to it, don't wan't to aknowledge the negative things. And keep rationalising as to why to stay in the relationship.
Edit: I also frequent many different football club forums and what you said about the refs, I have seen in every single one of them. There's always a bunch of fans who are really convinced the refs are against them. It's usually a few who start saying this and others tag along. And all these teams play in the same league.:)
Also, I believe good points have been made by all the other posters above as well.