Board Thread:Speculation House/@comment-26417457-20190905232433/@comment-27312496-20190906225148

The thing is RWBY hasn't presented itself as one of those shows where characters were born evil or just up and decided to be evil one day for no reason. In fact the antagonist of the show don't even see themseleves as evil. So its also not one of those clichi "I'm so evil ha ha ha." shows either.

Salem became what she is after all the hardship she endured and then tried to end her immortlity through the pools of grimm only to come out worse.

Adam became spiteful towards humans after his own hardships.

Hazel joined Salem out of vengence for his sister.

Raven was raised by bandits and was also driven by her fear of Salem.

So I think its safe to say that the others (ie. Cinder, Watts, Neo and even Tyrian) all have somehthing in their backstories that made them who they are now.