My suggestion would be
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You have my vote! 
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Mine too.
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Mine three.
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Yeah I think the + x works really well.
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I like the × most as well.
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At least we don’t have an executioner’s ax or a guillotine.
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Ah, darn it, I was going to support the X, but @Conrad_Melville proposes a very compelling alternative…
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+1 to the X (although I don’t have any problem with the frowns face)
I also like 
for challenges, but on the topic of “neutralizing” verbiage, haven’t we also had a discussion about making “challenge” into “invite”? If so I don’t think we would want to move towards swords 
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Maybe a dove of peace to represent the invite?
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Or more like 
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How about a broken chain symbol?
Anything that illustrate “disconnect” I’d say, in a neutral way.
Reminds me, BTW, of my wish for exchanging “Game Challenge” with “Game invitation”.
A while later: Oh, I missed that @benjito already mentioned that 
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Returning to the issue at hand, I’m content to leave things as they are or adopt one of the mild changes described but…
The hijacking of the word ‘friend’ by the online world is one of my pet hates so perhaps another solution is to change from ‘friend’ to ‘contact’ which likewise makes the ‘unfriend’ into ‘uncontact’ with less negative vibery imho. 
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Which is why I write it always this way on FB:
FB “friends”
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So “friends” (using the current term) on OGS seem to currently behave in a reciprocal fashion, where adding a friend (which must be accepted) creates a mutual contact listing. Also, OGS keeps “friends” lists private.
Another paradigm, commonly used in various social networks, is the “follower”/“following” lists, where the relationship is not necessarily mutual. Whether or not these are private is another design question, but if private, one would never even realize that one had been unfollowed (or was even followed in the first place).
Related to the question of “friend”/“follower” functionality is what additional privileges such a connection might grant. Currently, the “friends” list on OGS seems fairly mild, with (I think) it only being a bookmark to your “friend” on your homepage, and a convenient way to see if they are online. Since bookmarking is already a feature built into nearly all browsers, it seems that the online status might be the primary privacy concern (in addition to the clutter issue).
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You can see the same status for any user simply by opening a chat box with them (which they won’t even know about unless you message something)
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Yes, I was aware of that, and it’s also visible in a bunch of places, like chat rooms (if they are active in those) and group membership lists, so it’s not really a private thing (as it’s currently implemented), but some might feel a bit weird having it so immediately accessible on another user’s homepage, rather than via some other way that has at least a little bit of friction.
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A dagger 
to represent you stabbing them in the back.
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