User blog comment:DearlySkies/Writing a Backstory/@comment-26130256-20150505204321

Disclaimer:  The views expressed in this comment are the sole property of Cardshark92, and should not be considered in line with reality or conventional wisdom.

There's some excellent points here, but I feel I have to nitpick a little. You seem to have confused "hardship" with "character flaws" as for making characters. Just because some one has horrible things happen to them doesn't make them more or less perfect. Think of Jesus:  He was supposedly perfect (but, being the original Messainic archetype, we can give him a pass), but his life, especially the end, just plain sucked. Other people who go through that kind of ringer often wind up bitter, violent, and distant.

And to reverse this idea, I know a number of people who grew up with both parents in a loving, non-abusive or poverty-stricken environment. Some are well adjusted, nice people, and some become entitled pricks. How "perfect" a person is has nothing to do with how horrible their life is. To summarize my idea:

Hardships are external events that cause a character problems (Velvet's bullying, Pyrrha's lack of friends due to pedestal complex, Weiss's (implied) abuse, Blake's tragic past)

Character flaws are internal qualities that are considered undesirable (Weiss's arrogance, Ruby's naivete, Roman's racism, Velvet's extreme timidity)

Hardships can often cause character flaws, and character flaws often bring hardships on people, but not always. IMHO, a good character needs at least a little of both.

Thanks for the blog post that made me think, and feel free to respond. It's been too long since I've had a stimulating debate about stuff like this.