A horrible person, but...

On Critique Circle, there is a writing challenge activity. The prompt is to describe a horrible person whom you would not want to have in your life. The limitations are:
A). No descriptions of violence (murder, physical abuse, etc.)
B). No casting magic curses (turning people to stone, sleeping curses, etc.)
C). No derogatory slurs (although they can be prejudiced, as long as it's tastefully done).

This is an interesting challenge, since A and B are something that are quite common in my writing when looking at the actions of my antagonists. This isn't surprising, since A) and B) are very common in the fantasy genre (C is less common). Villains in fantasy fiction often are villains because of either their willingness to rely on violence and/or on magical curses. Violence is very common in Game of Thrones; magic curses on Once Upon a Time.

In my book, for example, there are antagonistic characters who possess magic and use that ability to get what they want by enacting curses that may not be violent, but can still be harmful, such as turning someone into a gold statue or a sleeping curse. (I'm trying to describe this without giving away any spoilers!) On the other hand, there are also characters in this book (The Face of the Pumpkin), who do not possess magic, and they tend to result in physical violence, such as murder, mugging or bullying.

When you take the previous actions away, however, there's still a lot more than can be seen as horrible. For example many would consider greed and ignorance to be a type of evil. There is also robbery/thievery, but this sometimes depends on the context, since there are noble thieves such as Robin Hood. Stealing/cheating is a characteristic that can be seen as anti-hero more so than full-on evil. Abandonment and neglect can also be seen as quite horrible. Perhaps one of the worst non-violent things in my mind that someone can do is extreme gossip, to the point where they spread lies and manipulate facts to ruin someone, but again it depends on the context on how malicious is their intent. Kidnapping someone/ or keeping an innocent a prisoner and keeping the truth from them, even if there is no physical violence can also be pretty bad. Emotional abuse can be extremely damaging.

In the end, different people may have different limitations, depending on their sense of humanity. There are many who have no problem with lying, cheating and stealing, but draw the line at violence. At least to the point of fatal violence. Others do not want to have literal blood on their hands, but will walk away and ignore those who are in need.

I look forward to see what kind of characters people write in the upcoming days!