History HateSink / Literature

* ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'':
** InUniverse example. Emmanuel Goldstein, leader of [[LaResistance the Brotherhood]], actually has two minutes of each day devoted to members of [[TheEmpire the Party]] unleashing their fury on him. [[spoiler: It's heavily implied that Goldstein doesn't even physically exist, but was instead fabricated by the highest echelons of the Party with the specific purpose of becoming a Hate Sink for its lower-ranking members (thus allowing them to direct their pent-up frustrations about their [[CrapsackWorld terrible living conditions]] away from the Party itself). O'Brien even admits to having authored part of "The Book", which is essentially Goldstein's manifesto, himself.]]
** O'Brien is this for the readers. There is really no redeeming quality about him and his entire motivation is power for the sake of power.

* ''Literature/NightOfTheAssholes'': In a world where being an asshole is like a zombie virus, no character in the book is more of an asshole (in the conventional sense) than Ellen. Everything she says or does is based around her own ego and an almost pathological contempt for the world around her. All she ever does is judge or insult Todd and Barbara and their decisions, preferring to hide out in the house's enormous grandfather clock. She mocks Barbara for accepting Todd's lint-covered sandwich after denying her any of the candy she had in her purse. Her relationship with her husband Harold is clearly abusive, with her calling him a child at several points, speaking for him, and generally ordering him around like a repeat target of a high-school bully. The only redeeming quality she seems to have is that she cares for the well-being of her daughter and even then she keeps her under constant sedation because [[spoiler: the HatePlague had turned her into ''goddamn UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler'' and created a massive risk in all of their survival by keeping an asshole with them in the house]].

* ''Literature/WarriorCats'':
** [[BigBrotherBully Socks and Ruby]], from the manga ''[[ComicBook/WarriorCatsTheRiseOfScourge The Rise of Scourge]]'', are extremely petty and unsympathetic. They start off saying to Scourge (then a kitten named Tiny) that "unwanted kittens get drowned or killed" and they egg Scourge on to venture into the wilderness where he meets a young Tigerpaw. Scourge gets savagely beaten to the point of almost dying until Bluestar stops it. When Scourge returns from the beating, Socks and Ruby scoff at him and they claim he should have died and chide him for entering the wilderness in the first place, when it was [[NeverMyFault their]] goading that did that. As far as awful siblings in the series go, these two are in a class of their own, and indirectly started Scourge's rise to power and subsequent JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope. When they get abandoned by their humans, Scourge has them exiled.
** [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain Darkstripe]] is Graystripe's evil [[CainAndAbel older brother]] and a [[TheBully bully]] to non-Clan cats. He starts the series as Tigerstar's top enforcer while taunting Firestar (formerly Rusty) with "Once a kittypet, always a kittypet" despite however many times Firestar proves his loyalty to the Clans. He truly begins to sink low after it's revealed he tried to [[WouldHurtAChild poison]] Sorrelkit for seeing him meet [=ShadowClan=]'s deputy Blackfoot. Then Tigerstar orders him to execute Stormpaw and Featherpaw, both [=halfClan=] cats and children of Graystripe, his own brother, and a [=RiverClan=] cat named Silverstream. When Stonefur, the current deputy of [=RiverClan=], and also a [=halfClan=] cat defends them, he is murdered by Darkstripe and Blackfoot together. During the fight against [=BloodClan=], Darkstripe tries to kill Firestar out of sheer malice, despite the fact he is fighting on the side of Tigerstar's killer saying "Nothing matters, all I want is to see you dead." Showing no remorse for any of his actions, and only fearing death when it happens, he was truly one of the most despicable of Tigerstar's minions.

** InUniverseExample. Emmanuel Goldstein, leader of [[LaResistance the Brotherhood]], actually has two minutes of each day devoted to members of [[TheEmpire the Party]] unleashing their fury on him. [[spoiler: It's heavily implied that Goldstein doesn't even physically exist, but was instead fabricated by the highest echelons of the Party with the specific purpose of becoming a Hate Sink for its lower-ranking members (thus allowing them to direct their pent-up frustrations about their [[CrapsackWorld terrible living conditions]] away from the Party itself). O'Brien even admits to having authored part of "The Book", which is essentially Goldstein's manifesto, himself.]]

* InUniverse Example: In ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', Emmanuel Goldstein, leader of [[LaResistance the Brotherhood]], actually has two minutes of each day devoted to members of [[TheEmpire the Party]] unleashing their fury on him. [[spoiler: It's heavily implied that Goldstein doesn't even physically exist, but was instead fabricated by the highest echelons of the Party with the specific purpose of becoming a Hate Sink for its lower-ranking members (thus allowing them to direct their pent-up frustrations about their [[CrapsackWorld terrible living conditions]] away from the Party itself). O'Brien even admits to having authored part of "The Book", which is essentially Goldstein's manifesto, himself.]]

** [[RoyalBrat Joffrey Baratheon]] himself fills this role eminently by being the most vicious and abusive little shit in a series full of them [[spoiler:until he's killed in the third book. Even InUniverse, only Cersei mourns his death.]]

* ''Literature/SwordArtOnline'' has Nobuyuki Sugou. Let us examine the full extent of his villainy: Steals the minds of 300 players just when they are about to regain their freedom from the death game, SAO. Performs horrible [[FakeMemories memory manipulation]] experiments on said minds in order to develop a MindControl technology, which he plans to sell to a [[EvilInc corrupt corporation]] that will no doubt use it for unfathomable evil. Keeps [[spoiler:Kirito's lover Asuna]] (one of the 300, but thankfully excluded from experiments) prisoner in a cage within the virtual world, where he frequently torments and sexually assaults her. [[spoiler:Torments Kirito with the knowledge that he is the one keeping Asuna prisoner, and that he plans to effectively "marry" her in the real world (not legally, of course, but that doesn't matter). When Kirito finally shows up in-game, Sugou abuses his admin powers to torture Kirito with excruciating pain while he molests Asuna, and threatens to alter both of their minds. The eventual gruesome and extremely painful death of his avatar at Kirito's hands is well-deserved and very satisfying.]]
** Endou and her GirlPosse from the Phantom Bullet arc, who bully Shino for money by deliberately [[TraumaButton triggering]] her PTSD regarding guns. It's even worse in the light novel version, as it's revealed that Shino, [[IJustWantToHaveFriends desperate to make friends]], befriended them without knowing that they wanted to take advantage of her [[MinorLivingAlone living by herself]] to party in her apartment. When she finally got fed up and reported them, they found out about her past and decided to bully her to get revenge.

** ''Literature/TheSilmarillion'': [[TheUsurper Ar-Pharazon]] from the ''Akallabeth'' was the nephew of the King of Numenor, Tar-Palantir. When the king died, Ar-Pharazon [[VillainousIncest forced the king's daughter to marry him]], considered an act of great evil and usurped the throne of Numenor. When Sauron declared himself King of Men, Ar-Pharazon took it as a challenge to his ego and resolved to make Sauron serve him, which backfired when Sauron charmed his way into Ar-Pharazon's council, persuading Ar-Pharazon to worship [[SatanicArchetype Morgoth]], instituting a ReligionOfEvil which practiced HumanSacrifice. Sauron eventually persuaded Ar-Pharazon to take Valinor, the land of the Gods, by force, and Ar-Pharazon's choice to lay claim to Valinor doomed Numenor when [[{{God}} Eru]] separated Valinor from the rest of the world and caused Numenor to be lost beneath the waves. While the rest of Numenor is mourned for its loss of a golden age, Ar-Pharazon is not, and he is condemned to linger in the world until the end of time.

** Patrick Bateman, a soulless corporatist who butchers people for both fun and to vent his own superiority complex. [[spoiler:Even if he isn't actually killing anybody, he's still a racist, sexist, classist, homophobic asshole who enjoys fantasizing about it]]. A rare example of a HateSink being the [[VillainProtagonist main character]] and narrator of the story.

* ''Franchise/CthulhuMythos'': The Defiler is one of the few of his kind that can be regarded as truly evil, being a cosmic SerialRapist and SerialKiller that has absolutely no problems with defiling and murdering anyone he gets his hands on.

* ''Literature/BloodMeridian'': Although pretty much all of the main characters are some of the worst people you can imagine, "White" Jackson stands out because his one and only character trait is that he's extremely racist, and while many of the other members of Glanton's Gang are racist themselves (they ''have'' been hired to kill indigenous people, after all), none are as petty about as he is, and pretty much all of his pagetime is him complaining about having to work with the African American member of the gang, "Black" Jackson. Because of his bad attitude, when he's decapitated by Black Jackson early on in the gang's journey for mouthing off one too many times, nobody objects.

* ''Literature/AkuyakuReijounoNakanoHito'' (aka ''The One Within The Villainess'') has Pina, the Star Maiden and game protagonist. Or, rather, Rina, the transmigrator who reincarnated in Pina's body. Despite claiming she's only "making the story go the way it's supposed to," she's selfish, spoiled, spiteful, and manipulative, only caring about sleeping with as many boys as possible (much to the ''real'' Pina's horror, as she's trapped within her body and unable to do anything to stop her body being used like this), bankrupting the national treasury demanding lavish gifts, and horribly ruining the lives of anyone she can't control. Flashbacks reveal she was like this even before coming into the game's world, having been expelled for her persistently vicious and nasty treatment of classmates.

* Caelan from ''Literature/SkulduggeryPleasant'' is a blatant knockoff of [[{{Literature/Twilight}} Edward Cullen]]: a morose, brooding vampire who lusts after the female protagonist, Valkyrie Cain, to the point that he sees himself as her guardian angel and wants to control her life. He is hated by pretty much every other character (even the other vampires), his obsession is frequently mocked, and [[spoiler: he's eventually killed by the very person he was so in love with.]]

* ''Ancillary Justice'' has Seivarden Vendaai fill this role in the first part, before the main villain is introduced. She's from a rich noble family, treats everyone else like they're dirt under her feet, and when, at the start of the novel, she has lost everything and has to be rescued by Breq, she's still insufferably arrogant and refuses to do any work at all, until Breq makes it clear she won't tolerate this behavior. [[spoiler: After Breq saves her life by jumping down a bridge from which Seivarden has fallen out of sheer stupidity, and breaks all the bones in her own body just to save Seivarden,]] Seivarden gets a bit more tolerable. The reader doesn't so much want to see Seivarden fail (at this point, Seivarden does not have any goals, unless you count the next drug dose as such) as she just wants Breq to get rid of her and continue her journey alone. Later in the trilogy, however, Seivarden ''does'' become both more useful and a more likeable character, and even manages to kick the habit; although she's still very much a flawed person, she is at least aware of this and seems to be working on it.

* ''Literature/AncillaryJustice'' has Seivarden Vendaai fill this role in the first part, before the main villain is introduced. She's from a rich noble family, treats everyone else like they're dirt under her feet, and when, at the start of the novel, she has lost everything and has to be rescued by Breq, she's still insufferably arrogant and refuses to do any work at all, until Breq makes it clear she won't tolerate this behavior. [[spoiler: After Breq saves her life by jumping down a bridge from which Seivarden has fallen out of sheer stupidity, and breaks all the bones in her own body just to save Seivarden,]] Seivarden gets a bit more tolerable. The reader doesn't so much want to see Seivarden fail (at this point, Seivarden does not have any goals, unless you count the next drug dose as such) as she just wants Breq to get rid of her and continue her journey alone.

* ''Literature/JurassicPark'' has Dennis Nedry. He has [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal a reasonable motive for betraying the park]] (he was overworked, underpaid, and at least in the novel the higher-ups blamed him for the inevitable glitches and bugs that emerge from one guy having to build a complex system from scratch), and in [[Film/JurassicPark1993 the movie]], he's a LaughablyEvil LargeHam, but this doesn't make Nedry less of a greedy, selfish, and all-around unpleasant SmugSnake who carelessly puts lives at risk for money, giving us a human antagonist to root against.

* ''Literature/BleachCantFearYourOwnWorld'': Tokinada, the BigBad, is purposefully written to be as despicably evil as possible. He's the only Bleach villain to be a CardCarryingVillain, and his every action is done because ItAmusedMe. He may attempt to justify it by saying he's correcting a mistake from Soul Society's past, but everyone knows better, [[StrawHypocrite including him]].