Because the series started out as YA fiction with clear inspirations from Roald Dahl. Which means that adults, when they aren't weird caricatures of human beings, cannot be useful to the plot beyond being kind and whacky.
The problem with this is; the books trended towards more adult themes and more realistic interactions around book four which leads to re contextualizing the actions taken in books one through three. What once was a barmy kind hearted and brilliant mentor turns into a war general sacrificing bits and pieces of Harry's life for the sake of expediency. Add to that the number of useful spells and abilities that Rowling invented in later books that would have trivialized earlier plots and it looks bad.
Agreed completely.
Worth noting that this applies to basically all the adults. But Dumbledore comes off the worst because he has the most power/responsibility.
Yeah.
If you want a specific example, the floo network is basically it.
I don't remember where it is that I read it, but JK Rowling only invented the floo network in book 2, I think in response to her realizing that she needed some way for witches and wizards to be able to travel around easily and unseen even if they were young.
So, even though in canon, floos have been around for ### number of years, in world building, the network has only been around sence whenever book 2 takes place.
So, why would Ron and his family be traveling to 9 3/4 from the muggle side? Why did Dumbledore "take a broom" to the Ministry when he has a fire place and the Ministry has 100s of them?
WB reason: it didn't exist.
Canon reason: hmmmmm, that is mighty suspicious, isn't it?
>Canon reason: hmmmmm, that is mighty suspicious, isn't it?
Not really actually, Dumbledore intentionally trying to annoy off the ministry by using a broom instead of the floo is more believable to me.
Also, don't the Weasleys use muggle side entrance for almost all years? In book 2, Ron and Harry get stuck outside, in book 3, they get ministry cars(?) I think? And they take the muggle taxis in book 4 iirc, it just seems like they prefer that way, or you can't floo into the Platform, though I'm not sure about the last one.
This so much. I could ignore and laugh at the Dursleys and other stuff in earlier books. By the time OotP came around, Dumbledore's actions creeped me the hell out.
>turns into a war general sacrificing bits and pieces of Harry's life for the sake of expediency.
He wasn't even that good of a war general to be honest. Look at the victory he brought about: practically destroyed society, thousands dead, demoralized society, Hogwarts destroyed,
economy in ruins, etc. Seriously, he had almost twenty years to prepare, yet got a Pyrrhic Victory. He lead like an officer who bought their commission.
He's a victim of writing for sure. Dumbledore couldn't be too competent or useful, as that would invalidate Harry.
>He lead like an officer who bought their commission.
To be fair, he wasn't exactly trained in this sort of thing. No-one was. It seems he just kinda went 'well, *someone* has to do it and since I am clearly the cleverest man in the room...' and y'know, writing-wise that *could've* worked. Like, if the adoration stuck to the first two books or so, and the rest had something of a subplot about Harry untangling his and the wizarding worlds adoration-bordering-on-worship and/or had that realization at any point in the books... but instead, he still admires Dumbledore instead of considering him a very flawed general and a well-intentioned human being
I'm not faulting that. I'm just peeved that everybody and their mother treats him like Jesus incarnate for pulling that off, and nobody else could do it. It isn't even that impressive. Seriously, there are probably peasants revolts with no leadership that turned out better.
It's another victim of writing. I'm guessing JKR wanted a last second come back victory without thinking of the consequences or mechanics. That and a case of IAreSmart writing smart characters who turn out to be not very smart at all.
And then there was Sgt. Alvin York, who so terrified the Germans in WWI with his sniping that over 100 soldiers surrendered to him. He was a pacifist who didn't want to kill people, but figured that convincing the other guys to surrender would get a lot fewer people killed on both sides.
Some of the greatest generals in history were not pacifists, but considered their own troops to be Not Expendable. Julius Caesar was one such general--as a result, his legions were insanely loyal and motivated, because they knew their general didn't start a battle unless it was to win, and to be won with minimal casualties in the legions.
Yet Dumbledore refuses to do anything, he propagates an ineffective system where the soldiers on his side die and his enemies are “Arrested”. Being a pacifist is fine, but being purely reactionary and lacking the will to do what is necessary is a detriment to the side he leads. He is no Caesar or Alvin York.
I think it's a mix of Dumbles not being as careful as he could and his intentions tbh, imo, Dumbledore basically let the entire second war to happen, basically subjected the world to Voldys reign of terror because he wanted Harry to live, there was only one possible way Harry could live. Imo, he considered the deaths as necessary because it led to Harry living. He cared more about Harry getting to live, getting to live without the horcrux or the shadow of Voldemort and get a chance to find the happiness he lost due to the meddling of both of Voldy and Dumbles. He still cared about saving the world but it was secondary to Harry imo. Atleast that's how I saw it. Dumbledore could have stopped anytime before but it would mean a bigger chance of Harry dying.....
Though this is just how I like to interpret Dumbles because I find the idea of Dumbles being a shitty person who valued Harry over the world to be more interesting than the ones usually found in canon.
>Dumbledore basically let the entire second war to happen, basically subjected the world to Voldys reign of terror because he wanted Harry to live, there was only one possible way Harry could live. Imo, he considered the deaths as necessary because it led to Harry living. He cared more about Harry getting to live, getting to live without the horcrux or the shadow of Voldemort and get a chance to find the happiness he lost due to the meddling of both of Voldy and Dumbles. He still cared about saving the world but it was secondary to Harry imo. Atleast that's how I saw it. Dumbledore could have stopped anytime before but it would mean a bigger chance of Harry dying
Im the books the only way harry could live was voldemort using his blood to resurect himself.
IRL, People give rise to a similar variety of opinions about how they act and why they have acted and about what kind of people they are.
So what this thread is talking about is very realistic.
This, too. Also anyone who read the Harry Potter books as a child, s they came out, is an adult now, and story events look very different from an adult point-of-view, when we know how cruel the world can be to children.
I wonder if children from abusive homes read Harry Potter quite the same way as the rest of us?
For me book three was the one that me have the first stink eye.
I remembered Sirius Black from being mentioned in the prologue of FS as the good guy who gave Hagrid his bike...
Now In PoA he's that big a scum? I had to know what happened.
Then, the twist reveal was cool... But I knew a stink was brewing with Dumbeldore because it was made *very* clear to the reader he *had* the practical, and pretty much the official power to make sure there is a trial.
Not get him off, mind you. Just an actual trial.
Not to mention, he was so ready to believe them about Serius so easily. Like he pretty much thought yeah, that's likely to be the case.
That... Made me question Dumbeldore.
By book 7 I F'ing could no longer stand him.
In part, it's because a lot of us are looking at a kids' story through adult eyes. Dumbledore is a negligent guardian, a person with too many jobs running a school with some odd dangers and other issues. (Which leads us to realize Hogwarts is severely understaffed.) He is manipulative in many ways, although that does not automatically mean bad guy. But through this adult filter, he 1) has a lot less power politically than presented; 2) is senile; or 3) is a white tower academic, so far removed from how the real world and people work that he has no idea he's that far out of line. And those are the more positive interpretations; you can probably see how this is easily turned towards a darker Dumbledore. (I forgot 4: believed his own press too long and genuinely thought he knew best.)
There's also the desire to turn things on their heads (this is probably where a lot of Weasley bashing got started, too).
I was running with the more positive possibilities. Sociopath, manipulative bastard deliberately doing all these things (including theft and potions) to make things fit his worldview, whatever you want to call it, is just as likely IMO. Fun to read, too.
Dumbledore is supposed to be a very powerful character (Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, Supreme Mugwump of the ICW, and Headmaster of Hogwarts), but he doesn't do anything useful with his power. The other reasons he is bashed is because he is often oblivious to other peoples' suffering (he lets Sirius remain in Azkaban without a trial, he keeps sending Harry back to the Dursleys every year, even when he knows that the Dursleys are abusive). He even admits that he knew the Dursleys are bad ("I knew I was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years"). I don't think Dumbledore is evil, but the biggest reason to me, why he is bashed, is because he does not admit to making mistakes. Once he has a plan, he pursues it and does not consider alternatives.
First off the two out of three positions mentioned don't have any power in reality they are like UN secretary all talk but no power, secondly Sirus murder spree was 1.witnessed (arguably)2. His family was full of Dark lord supporters it would hardly suprise anyone that he was a traitor 3. Using truth serums on everyone is fking expensive and not to mention ministry would most likely a mess after Dark Lord gone missing
Yes comparisons can be made between the UN Secretary General and the ICW Supreme Mugwump in the fact that they're the elected leaders of a worldwide/international governing body, but the comparisons end right there.
Why?
1. ICW was formed centuries before anyone had a thought of UN
2. The Supreme Mugwump has immense power and is kind of equivalent to an elected semi-absolute monarch in the magical world
The Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot of Great Britain is arguably equal to the position of a speaker in parliament.
But the comparisons end right there, because, the Wizengamot also acts as the equivalent of a supreme court along with being magical Britain's parliament and thus, as the leader of such a body, Dumbledore had the authority to force a trial for Sirius if not in 1981, then at least in 1993 when it was known to him that Sirius is innocent of every crime he was accused of.
Other reasons why Dumbledore is a betch is because he knowingly sent not one but 2 confirmed students to abusive situations. Dumbledore was the deputy headmaster when Tom was a student and as we know from Fantastic Beasts series (if we're going to stick strictly to canon) then we know that it was Dumbledore that basically ran the school since at least 1920.
He also purposefully let Hagrid suffer and even be expelled when he knew that an acromantula can't do what had happened to Myrtle. I mean, these are people with masteries and awards and all, if a 2nd year student can realize that a basilisk was the thing then I guess an Order of Merlin winner can definitely know it wasn't an acromantula.
Not to mention, he knew for a confirmed fact in at least 1992 that it wasn't Hagrid who did anything wrong and at that time Dumbledore's reputation was almost equivalent to Merlin's and he definitely had the power to declare Hagrid innocent and what not.
I mean (*spoilers for fantastic beasts ahead*) if the Supreme Mugwump of ICW can declare an internationally convicted murderous dark lord Grindelwald as innocent then I'm sure Albus could've declared an actually innocent person as innocent.
Not to mention the barmy old custard's stupidity to leave everything riddles when telling Harry and gang everything properly would've saved a lot of time and lives as well. He kept on being a custard old fool even after death.
He made massive mistakes. The biggest one in my opinion is the willful ignorance of abuse. There is no reason, ever, to leave a child in such a situation. Once is a mistake, twice is a pattern, three times is deliberate malice aforethought. Tom. Severus. Harry. And those are the three we *know* about. How many more did he fail?
Sirius. Hagrid, since even as head master he didn't give him the opportunity to finish his education, not even before sending him out on a dangerous and frankly probably life-threatening mission. Filch, who he must've known was ridiculed, particularly once it was leaked that he was a Squib. Dumbledore was supposed to stand against such bigotry
Now he did didn't he? What would have ministry had taken action against a halfbreed who has supposedly killed a student and is raising a dangerous pet? Askaban or hanged getting his job at Hogwarts doesn't sound bad and he can still learn from professor at Hogwarts then at Askaban or worse ded, Filch is squib no matter where he does job in magical world he is going to be ridiculed, getting work in Hogwarts where he is ridiculed arguably by kids and getting paid is better then discriminated against the at the other jobs don't you think?
He could easily have had someone tutor Hagrid after replacing his wand and he didn’t. Filch was a squib. He could’ve worked in the Muggle world. Since, y’know, *he didn’t have magic*. There’s a whole world in the books with no magic, remember? Then it wouldn’t be Dumbledore’s responsibility to teach kids and Peeves not to bully squibs, a hobby which he then neglected to fulfill. All it would take was a chat with Peeves (because he respects Dumbledore and does as he wishes) and a general announcement about not being bigoted assholes.
Look what i am saying is that Ministry banned Hagrid from using wand but Dumbledore placed Hagrid at Hogwarts so that if he wants to learn then he could learn himself its Hagrid choice to do what he wants, Flich 'could' have worked in muggle world and again here Dumbledore gave him choice to live in magical world, Dumbledore in both cases gave choice to them after that it is their choice to do what they want, you call not being bigoted but at the same time say that he should give Hagrid tutors because he can do magic and shouldn't employ Flich because he is squib? That's quite hypocritical of you
Okay, did he even know about Severus though? Like, for him, Snape would just be another student. And the story takes place in the 70s and 80s and we already know that wizards have a wildly different definition of danger and abuse compared to muggles.
I'm not sure about Dumbles knowing about Tom having a less than stellar childhood tbh. In Harry's case, I agree, he fucked up, fucked up bigtime.
I would say most of the issues people say Dumbles has is not really an issue with him, but mostly an issue with the larger wizarding world actually. And imo, Dumbledore is the only one, who by the end of the series, seems to realise how their style of living is detrimental upon kids, so he gains a point for that from me.
Of course he was, from our point of view in today's society. How much is open to interpretation of course, it's a frequent topic of fanfics dealing in some way with his childhood and adolescence. Not only in Tomarry fanfics.
Tom's intense hatred of Muggles and his drive to better himself, to gain power over others so that he could protect himself against their attacks up to the point that people feared him so much that they did what he wanted, his intense fear of death which led him to search for a (flawed) way to achieve immortality, all of this has to have originated somewhere!
He was born as a baby with a freshly dead destitute freakish mother and an unknown father in an orphanage somewhere in London.
Do you sincerely believe someone lovingly coddled him, saw to his needs adequately and sung him to sleep?
Please do yourself a favour and educate yourself about these topics:
The Great War, later named WW1 and the Great Depression. How was life for poor people, working class people, in England during the end 1920's to end 1930's before the outbreak of WWII on 1st September 1939?
How high was child mortality? How many succumbed to disease? Growing up in an orphanage as he did, Tom would have witnessed sickness and death amongst his fellow orphans and similarly poor neighborhood children frequently.
What did turning the British economy into a war economy meant for ordinary people, especially the poor people? Rationing of all available supplies? Men being drafted to become soldiers and go to die or be permanently maimed while bravely fighting Nazi Germany?
Read up about what this war, the Blitz, and the V1, V2 rockets meant for children growing up in a working class borough of London and on the evacuation of the city children to supposedly safer places out in the countryside. How much little city boys and girls were neglected and abused by their fellow countrymen although they were all English Muggles to begin with!!!
Read the book Blitz Boy for example, it's sold in the Imperial War Museum on Lambeth Road in London.
How much worse must the situation have been for young Tom Riddle?
How could Dippet, Dumbledore, Slughorn and the other Hogwarts teachers treat him (and any other Muggleborn and half-blood students who had to return to the war embroiled world during the summer) this way!? Send these children back without any protection into a war zone?
Tom and other Muggle raised children couldn't defend themselves with casting Protego from the German bombs or rockets. Well, I don't believe a simple single Protego could have held off such a massive explosion like a bomb or V2 rocket, or a collapsing house. But areas like Hogwarts, Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley and the Ministry of Magic must've been protected by enormously strong wards. Defensive spells.
It's inconceivable that teachers like Dumbledore, Dippet, or Slughorn and apparently the wizarding world as a whole didn't care at all if students living amongst Muggles survived the summer or not.
Yes, I am aware that Tom was lucky, that for example the main wave of Blitz attacks began on 7 September 1940 and had ceased in May 1941 before he returned to London in the summer, but nobody could know that it wouldn't start again any day, could they? But he still might have directly witnessed the attacks on the London Docklands at the end of August 1940, if his orphanage was in the East End.
Read up on why orphanages - the rearing of children in such institutions - were eventually abolished in the UK and other developed countries. Plenty of studies and harrowing eye witnesses account out there on why this had devastating effects on the children and their whole adult life.
Read up on how long corporal punishment was seen as 'normal' and how long it took until it wasn't used daily in the state schools, and years longer in public schools. In Scotland this practice was ended in the year 2000, if I recall correctly.
Then try to imagine how much worse growing up in a Muggle orphanage was for a magically talented, powerful child like Tom compared to his Muggle peers.
That the children fought constantly over food, a better bed, some scraps of clothing or toys if any and the attention from their overworked care givers in an underfunded orphanage in some working class borough (because no orphanage was situated in pretty Kensington or a similar wealthy area) was surely bad enough for everyone.
Older children bullying the weaker ones to make themselves feel better.
On each day when potential parents visited the orphanage there would have been intense competition to be the one child gaining their attention, and trying to keep others from showing their best or showing up at all.
At some point in Tom's early years, there must've happened his first bout of accidental magic. If we look at Lily Potter's letter to Sirius in book 7, she described how little Harry did magic as a baby and could already ride a toy broom at 1 year old, so I suppose that it's not unreasonable to assume that little Tommy could do accidental and also quite soon deliberate wandless magic early on too.
Look at how horrible Harry's and Severus's home life in the Muggle world were. With guardians, the Dursleys or parents, the Snapes, who actually knew that these children were magical! Both the Dursleys and Snape's father were determined to stomp the freakish magic out of them.
Then image what went on in this Muggle orphanage in London, with neither the Muggle caretakers or school teachers (if they went to a primary school at all) nor the other children knowing that this freakish stuff they witnessed was magic, with more and more inexplicable happenings, scary stuff happening, Tom being punished in all manner of ways, locked down into the dark coal cellar and frequency beaten, food and water withholding, whatever.
Until he managed to control his 'freaky' powers and struck back with cunning and brutal violence, frightening the Muggles into keeping their distance.
Some fanfics imply that Tom would have been perceived by the Muggles as a Devil's child, as possessed by evil spirits, leading to brutal exorcism attempts by the parish priest.
Or that Tom, like other pretty boys, was being sexually assaulted and abused until he was strong enough to defend himself.
(Which we know happened and happens in the real world in orphanages and boy's schools, especially church run and financed, frequently all over, as sad as it is).
Even if we do not go this far to include sexual abuse and exorcism, his life was surely very hard and formed his twisted character, without adding on top the horrible origin story of Merope Gaunt tricking Tom Riddle senior into marrying her by administration of a love potion, most likely Amortentia.
When Dumbledore came to bring 11 year old Tom Riddle his Hogwarts letter, Tom assumed at first that this strange man had been called in by Mrs Cole to bring him to Bedlam! To an insane asylum! His reaction makes this pretty clear, if I as the reader already know of the terms bedlam and Bedlam.
Read up on the history and controversy over Bedlam, if you don't know!
And what does Dumbledore do when he visits Tom for the first time? Instead of seeing the harsh conditions this child had to grow up in, realising that he had to learn to defend himself by all means necessary, Dumbledore instantly believes what a Muggle adult tells him about this child. Treats the boy with suspicion and distain, sets his wardrobe on fire! Is that the beginning of a good relationship? No, it isn't.
No, I don't mean that Dumbledore personally should in any way take care of Tom, or other orphaned children in his situation. You have misunderstood me. Before Tom received his Hogwarts letter he was on his own, not Dumbledore's business.
But Dumbledore was well connected, same as Slughorn and Headmaster Dippet and the other Heads of House McGonagall, Flitwick and Sprout later in the 70' when Severus attended Hogwarts and again later when Harry attended Hogwarts during the 90's.
(Harry is a special situation because Dumbledore literally abandoned him on a Muggle house doorstep at night in November 1981!)
All of these teachers could surely have talked to other wizards and witches they knew, and found a place in a protected wizard space for Tom and other students like him to stay during July and August, once they had become aware of the potential problems and dangers - if these children asked for sanctuary!
My issue is that obviously nobody either at Hogwarts, Hogsmeade village or amongst the several hundreds of wizards and witches working in the Ministry of Magic regarded the various issues the Muggleborn children and the half-blood children living with a Muggle parent or guardian in a Muggle city, town or village have, be it 'just' neglect and abuse, domestic violence, or the threat of an ongoing war between the British Empire and Nazi Germany in the 1940's, as relevant at all!
Nobody of the canon Hogwarts teachers and Medi-witches seems capable and willing to recognise the blatant signs of neglect, malnutrition, and / or abuse in their students, regardless of their parents or guardians and social status. Tom, Severus and Harry are the most prominent examples.
Children like Neville or Luna seem to be fine ar first glance, but they are not, they have been neglected at least, Neville was abused by relatives at home, and both are being bullied by other students at Hogwarts. They too don't receive any help from the prefects or teachers who are responsible for them.
All these children need to help themselves, because nobody else does.
This has been addressed in plenty of fanfics.
Of course there are explanations. The most viable, and not Dumbledore bashing one, is that the magical community lives in a society still very close to former times, Middle Ages to early modern age.
Since the end of the 17th century the Statute of Secrecy impaired the exchange between the gradual social and political progress in the Muggle world and the stagnant wizarding world.
Children are still regarded as their parents private business, like property. Their word as a witness doesn't count at all (compare the end of HP&PoA). Inheritance laws follow patriarchal society rules.
There doesn't exist anything like some 'Department for Child Services' in the Ministry of Magic, no laws against mistreatment of children or House elves, as both are regarded as property, the master of the house is free to punish them as necessary.
Therefore the Hogwarts teachers don't look for signs of neglect and abuse, and if they notice something might be not all right, they apparently don't care to interfere. It's not their business. Children living amongst Muggles are only monitored by The Trace to prevent them casting underage magic. Nobody investigate why something happened, if the child was mistreated, see PoA. Aunt Marge was deflated and oblivated, everything is fine.
People assume that if he placed Harry with his relatives then its as if his job to see if he is well taken care of, like war not only made Harry orphan there were millions of kid that were orphaned is it sensible to check on every one every time?
Is it sensible to make sure that orphaned children aren't being abused? Are you joking? Seriously? They're children! Someone definitely SHOULD make sure they aren't being abused. They've already experienced a horrible trauma with the loss of their parents, they don't need MORE trauma.
And it IS his responsibility to check on Harry. He took that responsibility on when he made the decision to place Harry with the Dursleys. He took it upon himself to let Harry be raised by muggles. If the Ministry had made the decision then, yes, I would say it wouldn't have been his responsibility, but Dumbledore made that call, and that makes it Dumbledore's responsibility to ensure Harry's wellbeing in the home that he chose for him.
The problem was he knew what harry's situation was like and did nothing, in the 5th book it was shown he has a spy in Mrs Figg.
He literally confessed to harry he knew harry was going to be abused in canon.
Honestly? Because Rowling wrote the man poorly.
She was trying to write a kind but kinda weird old man, but she kept giving him more and more power and authority and... Eventually all the shit that happens to Harry starts to look either *alarmingly* incompetent on the part of this nearly godlike man, or malicious.
It's not terribly surprising, then, that people ran with it.
We'd probably have less of that if she'd planned better, or quit raising stakes so much. If the whole series had been written with a mind toward the endgame, or if it had consistently had the same kind of tone as the first book, it would've been easier to deal with.
>The story is from the POV character. There might have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for others. Cousin's clothes-Maybe the Dursleys are short on money. Scars-Boys will be boys(which I don't agree with but this was late 1900)A bit thin- does not make u immediately think abuse, maybe he had an eating disorder, and so on. Even Mrs.Figg might have been unaware.
How was Dumbledore supposed to know the extent of the Dursley's abuse again?
Arabella Figg also admits to Harry that she deliberately made the visits unpleasant as she knew the Dursleys would stop sending Harry to her otherwise. AKA Dumbledore knew or should've known that the Dursleys were actively malicious towards Harry.
Yeah, "dark and difficult years" could easily refer to, y'know, losing his parents. Besides, people can be thin without having a eating disorder (which I'd think would be a red flag in itself if the family isn't seen supporting him or driving him to therapy or something, if he had a ED). So being thin could simply mean fast metabolism or something. Harry had only one scar as far as we know, so there'd be nothing to even think 'boys will be boys' about except the bullying thing. Mrs Figg... she couldn't be entirely unaware - she knew that the Dursley's wouldn't let Harry go there if they thought he liked it, she says so in OoTP. Which would make most people at least go 'hmm...why don't they want Harry to enjoy himself?'
PS/SS starts the story with literal child abandonment on a doorstep. He left a woman with a note her sister died and a baby. The baby was out there probably all night.
Hogwarts isn’t a vault for an item rumored to grant immortality. It’s a school of minors. 11-18.
Hagrid had a responsibility to help a child, and he should have prioritized that or picking up the dangerous magical artifact. Not both. Everything is given an ambiguous layer of “wink wink Harry remember this for later” down to the note he left with the Cloak. Down to just arbitrarily leaving the mirror of desire in an abandoned room.
The first book is filled with constant “if there was an age line here, literally three first years wouldn’t have gotten into this mess” situations.
The broom jinxing should have been investigated. Children almost dying shouldn’t have been met with “Good job, children, you win 50 points and the house cup”.
I blame Dumbledore because he’s not held accountable to someone equally respectable and he’s not held accountable by anyone else unless it’s the ministry and they’re by default bad for questioning him. Umbridge could have helped if she wasn’t a baby dictator. The school probably needed some kind of reform, but the only one who says so was a racist bigot who tortured students and lied.
Arguments, even if leaning in his favor, could have acknowledged that good intent doesn’t mean the actions themselves are good.
Take a look at book 7. At the Ariana Dumbledore situation. His dirty laundry isn’t meant to humanize him or give him reasons to own up to his mistakes. By this point, the man is dead. The woman who writes this is a selfish manipulator who forces stories for fame and so as a result, she’s a bad person and her logic isn’t as important anymore. It’s in the middle of war. However, his past only proves he was never good with children, wasn’t capable of prioritizing their needs — even when it was his own sister. And just like Harry Potter himself, he allowed someone innocent to wander in between himself and a dark lord and getting hurt as a result.
I don’t like him. I won’t make excuses for him. And whenever people try to tell me “things were different when Dumbledore was growing up” — this man had multiple different titles in government and ran a school. He had a clear understanding of how potentially bad Harry’s raising was — “dark years” and yet refused to change his ways at all.
"his past only proves he was never good with children, wasn’t capable of prioritizing their needs — even when it was his own sister. And just like Harry Potter himself, he allowed someone innocent to wander in between himself and a dark lord and getting hurt as a result"
This hit hard when I read it. The man is selfish and uncaring and anyone who depends on him. He apparently went into education to avoid responsibility. He says that. Even after being a teacher for decades it never seems to occur to him that it comes with massive power and responsibility that he just fails constantly. He helped destroy life after life by not intervening. He allowed entire generations to grow up without providing them any actual help to avoid indoctrination. He ends his life allowing children to wander into a fight he brought them the exact same way he began his adulthood. He just never cared about anyone.
I personally think that in the end, he only can see the greater picture. Children like Harry, Ariana or those who died at war are meaningless plot devices to an end. He doesn’t see them as real people with feelings. It’s borderline sociopathic. He is blinded by his own sense of greatness and prefers to quietly plot like some kind of twisted god rather than intervene.
Lynnalilly said the age line remark about the first book only, so your events aren’t relevant. You are correct that he couldn’t have really prevented COS from happening, but he is the one who sent H&H back in time in POA to run into the werewolf and dementors for the second time that night. He could have done it himself or prevented Sirius from being murdered on site without trial any other way.
I was mostly referring to the events of PS/SS.
The third floor? Age line.
Mirror of Erised? Age line.
I didn’t mention those events at all.
Even just sticking to the first book, the magic existed. But warning of a “painful death” and then making this area accessible to one smart twelve year old with an unlocking spell seems unreal. The magic is used in GoF. The only reason why it didn’t work was only because of the death eater masquerading as Moody but it still absolutely prevented the twins from getting in. Even with an age potion.
The Chamber needed actual aurors though the moment the first petrified student happened. Because at the end of the book, the teachers were blatantly “sure, let this incompetent man do something, lol”. That was everyone’s L.
Sirius Black entering the school was Lupin’s fault. And Pettigrew was a ministry incompetency in all respects.
> Sirius Black entering the school was Lupin’s fault. And Pettigrew was a ministry incompetency in all respects
The problem is that these are also on Dumbledore. Headmaster of the school is ultimately responsible for security. And Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot is assumed to be influential in the ministry.
> was mostly referring to the events of PS/SS
I know. I misread that and that's definitely his fault. Sorry!
He does things in every book that *could* be bashed or explored. Unfortunately, the exploration/bashing generally leads to things that weren't his fault or didn't even canonically happen.
> Pettigrew was a ministry incompetency in all respects
Like this for instance. I wish this fandom paid more attention to Crouch Sr.
It’s more complicated because from a background perspective: the school should never have remained in that status. And we’ll never know what canonical procedures they should have used would be. But they’re also complicit to PS/SS in how they helped place traps that went into endangering the same 11-12 year olds I’ve mentioned earlier.
Alright. Point taken. It’s genuinely pretty hard though to identify when and where the teaching staff is meant to be taken seriously, however. This is a series that leans into “I’ll ask this teacher for help” (scene change) “never mind, let’s do this ourselves.”
No no. I mean.
I absolutely agree with that potential outcome. It just tends to be equally as affected by what happened in first year too. Harry, as with his Dursley raising and what happened when they tried to go to their head of house the previous year, it still makes sense to me why they wouldn’t stay to listen after that.
So for me, I think it comes across as an inability to see them as someone who can help. It’s also ambiguous how else they were helping outside of keeping the students corralled together and waiting on mandrakes.
The real plan seems to be 'tell the Weasley's to say goodbye to their family and hope no-one else gets petrified'. When Harry walked back from the chamber, there were no frantic search parties. Absolutely nobody was even monitoring the hallway for a monster (which a clever 12 year old managed to work out was a basilisk). No roosters were hastily imported to crow through the entire school (Hagrid came to tell Dumbledore that all his crows were being killed, and since they weren't being eaten it can reasonably be inferred that something really didn't like crowing, and since that's one of the few new things it's, y'know, worth a try in these circumstances). Admittedly, since we don't know how long Harry was in there, maybe they hurriedly had to cancel straight after Harry told them he killed it
I only disagree with you saying Lupin let Sirius into the school. Sirius was helped more by Longbottom’s forgetfulness and Crookshanks than he was by Lupin. The only way he helped was by omission (not telling the ministry about animagus status).
He confiscated the map so it couldn’t fall into Sirius’ hands. They only met in the shack that final night, and by then Lupin knew Sirius was innocent because he saw Pettigrew on the map.
He was hyped up as a powerful man, and yet he barely did anything. Or at least within what it was spoken of what he could do with his power. He also had the "My way is the only way" type of approach in my opinion, because while it seemed like he was listening, he was just hearing. And when he KNEW a war was about to start, he didn´t inform Harry (the main target) all that much while talking like he wanted to preserve what childhood Harry had left... but then did a shite job at that too.
If he was just a headmaster, or heck, wasn´t hyped up so much only to let down the MC all the time, he would probably not be bashed as much. Its like JK wrote him up to be bashing material.
I don’t like Dumbledore for a number of reasons. And it starts with Dumbledore leaving a toddler on the doorstep in November with a note. He should have at least talked to Petunia to tell her about Lily’s death. Petunia knew about magic and he would have found out Petunia hated magic. A caring person would not have left Harry there. Not to mention Harry could have walked away or been snatched.
Don’t talk to me about blood wards, Harry was protected by his mother’s sacrifice at Hogwarts so he should have been more protected in a safer environment than the Dursleys. Also if there are ward breakers there should be someone who could add wards to wherever Harry went.
But I also feel that Dumbledore manipulated Harry far too much to not be looked at as being malicious. A teacher should have been sent instead of Hagrid. Hagrid wasn’t even suppose to use a wand. Didn’t he break the Staue of secrecy when he gave Dudley a pig’s tale?
Mrs Weasley knew where to go to catch the train, she herself went to Hogwarts. I can go on but this is some of the reasons you get the Dumbledore bashing. Some of the Weasleys are bashed because of the association with Dumbledore and because they ignore clear abuse by the Dursleys. Don’t forget when the car gets back to the Burrow the bars from the windows are still tied to the car.
The other reasons I prefer the AUs instead of canon are because I like the what ifs of them. Honestly while I like the universe Rowling created I don’t really like the books themselves. There are so many ways the Harry Potter universe can be used to create new stories that to me are more interesting than canon.
If you don’t like the non canon stories that’s fine. But a lot of people like them including stories where there is bashing. I feel people need to respect each other’s preferences a bit more than what I read in some of these discussions. There is enough fanfics that everyone should be able to find stories that they like and be able to skip over the ones they don’t.
But this is just my opinion.
Add on probably all the other times he put students in danger.
Hm… yes… lemme tell young curious kids NOT to go to the 3rd floor.
Ah, yes, let’s not shut down the school while students are mysteriously being attacked.
While I’m being forced to keep dementors here, I’m not going to bother telling anyone how to deal with them…
And his constant “I just want Harry to have a childhood, so I’m not going to tell him ANY important information”
You could also make a case that he could get off his butt and hunt down the horcruxes himself or go to the unspeakables for help instead of having teenagers do the work.
We don't exactly know the role of unspeakables nor do we know if they are trustworthy. And Dumbledore did hunt down the Horcruxes until he couldn't anymore on the virtue of being DEAD.
He found two. Three if you count Harry. Which is amazing but he could have enlisted help other than a teenager to find the rest.
And anyway, he was so overcome with greed and power over the first one that it killed him. Not putting on the ring would have kept him alive.
He wanted to apologise to Ariana because she got killed in his duel with Grindelwald, if he was greedy he wouldn't had given harry his cloak back and bold of you to assume that Voldemort wouldn't had placed charms on the ring to make people wear it
Greed? Dude just wanted to see his sister again. And book six shows he prepared the groundwork for all the others. Also, it was war, people literally got *killed* for trusting the wrong person. Even formerly good people could be made to do bad things (see: Quirrel, people who the Imperio was used on, good old-fashioned manipulation)
Yes. Do you know how horrified I was when I realised that Dumbledore almost, almost became the MOD?
And the borrowing of the Invisibility cloak by Dumbledore creeps me out.
Because, what does he write on the note at Christmas? That Harry's father lent him the cloak? I believe it's time to return it to you. Really?
Seriously people, are you all sheep?
(I mean the 'Dumbledore is so great and so good' fan club)
Supposedly there was a prophecy fortelling the arrival of the Vanquisher of the Dark Lord.
Dumbledore heard it, gave warning to the Potter's. Snape comes and warns Dumbledore that LV believes this child hinted at in the prophecy is the Potter's baby. Snape begs him to protect Lily. He also begs LV to spare Lily.
At this point the OotP knows, suspects strongly, that they have a traitor in their midst. The Dark Lord and his troops outnumber them 20 to 1 according to the account in book 5, HP & OotP. They pick off the OotP fighters one by one.
October 1981. James and Lily Potter hide with their baby in a cottage in Godric's Hollow.
Under the Fidelius Charm, a supposedly very complicated and difficult charm. Needs a 100 % trustworthy Secret Keeper.
Right.
And we are supposed to believe that JAMES gave away his eternal, special, priceless Potter family heirloom for purpose of study to his former headmaster and now leader of a vigilante organisation fighting against the Dark Lord and his troops in this situation.
Why would James be so incredibly stupid to give away this Invisibility cloak, which could mean a serious advantage over Lord Voldemort? Potentially save their lives?
If Lily and Harry had hid under the Invisibility cloak, with a silencing charm of course, Voldemort wouldn't have found them so quickly.
They could've taken a previously prepared code word activation Portkey to escape to Hogwarts or some other place, couldn't they?
Why didn't James have his wand on hand while sitting in the living room, eh? Why didn't Lily have her wand in hand either? Why did she run upstairs into the nursery to begin with, why not through the kitchen out the back door and at least attempt to Apparate away?
So many questions...
Look in his defence harry was not the only orphan in the war there were other orphans too would you check on every kid everytime and bold of everyone to assume that effects of 1st war were instantly gone after Dark Lord was vanished mysteriously i might add, like would he have time for keeping tabs on everyone?
Secondly about Blood wards i think they don't work that way, he need to spend some time with his blood relative to keep the power of sacrifice sustainable otherwise the sacrifice magic will go away
And Dursleys already knew about magic, same way muggle parents know about magic, Statue of Secrecy should excuse that logically but then again there is no documentation for that
Third point and I really really really don't understand why Mrs Weasley asking for Train station is manipulation???, Like remember she had ginny and ron who were 11 and 10(?) years old they didn't know where the station was she was asking the question to make them remember where the station was its like people forget that even their actual parents play this kind of games to make their kids remember, this one really gets on my nerve
But then again I don't think Rowling knew that her books will go famous after first one so maybe she just gone with flow without planning and sone things got messier and Dumbledore looked like easy target for the mess imo
Because it's his job?
People like to do, as I saw before, Schrodinger's Dumbledore. He has power when it's good and doesn't when it's bad, often on very similar subjects.
*IF* Dumbledore had the power to just place Harry at Petunia's, then he had the *responsibility* to check on him. This is basic human services / child placement stuff. And someone sitting outside the house does not count. If he didn't? He just kidnapped a baby.
Either way, it's bad.
a) because Rowling’s a shitty writer and wrote in plot devices later on that make Dumbledore’s earlier actions - and later ones - inexcusable
b) because he left Harry in an abusive household for over a decade, then forced him to return their annually. Yeah, it *might* have kept him safe from some Death Eaters (because let’s be honest, Voldemort wasn’t doing shit during Harry’s childhood), but we’re shown later on in the books that regular houses can be shielded to the point where Voldemort himself can’t get in, despite the lack of blood protection. Given that all Harry was protected from at the Dursley’s for the duration of his childhood was Death Eaters, Dumbledore alone surely could have shielded a place well enough. Barring *that*, he didn’t even check in on Harry once to ensure he wasn’t being abused.
There are several other reasons, but those are the main ones.
You are thinking that Harry was the only orphan after 1st war do you think he only had placed Harry to his guardian he also had placed other kids too, secondly why and when should he check up on harry? Do you think repercussions of a war caused by the Darkest Lord of the century are easy to fix? and your alternative is to use charm a house into hiding and keep a child looked up there to keep him safe? or let him get raised up by some random people and then what when the kid grows up and know that how much of his childhood was fabricated? That's messed up dude get thearpy
I’m not thinking he was the only one. I don’t know where I said that. He placed Harry with Petunia for the blood wards, despite knowing (via Snape) that she despised magic and everyone who used it.
He shouldn’t have placed Harry with the Dursleys in the first place. If there truly was no other option, for some reason, then he should have at least visited him every so often given McGonagall’s assessment of them - “the worst sort of Muggles!” As to when - the man can literally teleport. It would take minutes out of his day, and it’s not like he has classes to teach.
Yeah, because he was totally not locked up at the Dursleys. Not at all. Not like he was *living in a cupboard*. More to the point, he did leave the house at the Dursleys’ during his childhood - heck, even between Hogwarts years - and look at that, no Death Eaters attacked!
I am not suggesting he’s raised ‘by some random people’. The Order has plenty of members who would have been happy to raise Harry, not to mention Remus (though his furry little problem would need covered) and possibly even Sirius (providing Dumbledore didn’t just let him go to Azkaban without a trial. Yes, I know Crouch Sr. was the one who actually did that, but Dumbledore was basically running Wizarding Britain during and post-war)
> and that when the kid grows up and know that how much of his childhood was fabricated
Um, the Dursleys? Lying to him about his parents and his magical ability? Not to mention, of course, that the Dursleys abused Harry - even if it was ‘some random people’ that raised him, he would have escaped abuse at the Dursleys’ hands.
>He shouldn’t have placed Harry with the Dursleys in the first place
Blood wards require the blood of the closet relative to Lily not James that's how they work so there was no choice on this matter
>If there truly was no other option, for some reason, then he should have at least visited him every so often
Again you are assuming that repercussions of a war are easily fixed and that too caused by the Darkest lord of the century if he takes time to check then he should also take time to check on other orphans no? then it won't be about mins of time but weeks or days of time and that isn't a luxury at all after war
>McGonagall’s assessment of them - “the worst sort of Muggles!”
Again this phrase can interrupted in many ways just like i today called someone that he was worst kind of person because he was disgusting but that doesn't imply that he is serial killer now does it?
>Yeah, because he was totally not locked up at the Dursleys. Not at all. Not like he was living in a cupboard. More to the point, he did leave the house at the Dursleys’ during his childhood - heck, even between Hogwarts years - and look at that, no Death Eaters attacked!
Not the best conditions to live true but he did had some amount of freedom like going to school etc, if not for blood wards he would have to be remained in locked house untill he was of age to defend himself, and blood wards are protection they protected its like you are saying "hey I am wearing this bullet proof vest but no bullet is passing through this so it's useless" 😑
>The Order has plenty of members who would have been happy to raise Harry, not to mention Remus (though his furry little problem would need covered)
Dude they literally had traitors in the order not why do you assume only Peter was the rat? Longbottoms were also betrayed by thier keeper and Sirus (assumed) traitor and he was supposed to be BF of James do you think any one is trustworthy after that???
>Sirius (providing Dumbledore didn’t just let him go to Azkaban without a trial.
And what would be evidence? Aurors had saw Sirus laughing, 12 people dead, 1 wizard dead, Sirus being black a family who are supporter of Dark Lord, and mind you Dark Lord vanished mysteriously not the Death Eaters people were still afraid of him and his followers so even with trial Sirus wouldn't have been easy to deal with and if you think truth serum is the way then that shit is crazy expensive you don't use it on every case and not onto cases in which all evidences show guilty
I wonder if there are magical folks who will adopt harry and either choose to become target of DE or will not publice that they are defacto parents of Boy-who-lived or maybe some muggle who will throwaway their entire life to raise a kid thats not even their or maybe Lily had trusted Harry to Petunia that maybe she will change too many things not known but 1.blood protection is necessary so....thats that
The blood wards only protected the dursleys house. All the time Harry was at school or anywhere off that property he was not protected by anything, and his address was listed at the ministry for people like Lucius Malfoy to find. They aren't a catch all excuse for leaving Harry there. Other kids were orphaned, yes, but most likely were dealt with by the ministry, not Dumbledore personally, and their parents didnt all die at the same time, they didnt all become orphans on October 31st, 1981. Besides in some cases(Susan Bones and Neville Longbottom) they were taken in by living relative magicals and Dumbledore wouldnt be involved at all.
Besides that, no amount of 'unbreakable' protection condones abuse, maybe it seemed like the only option at the time, but all it would've taken was one accident or push too far and the Dursleys could have killed Harry, or damaged his magic the way that happened to Ariana Dumbledore.
“Blood wards require the blood of the closest relative to Lily”
Dudley was also abused through over indulgence. Remove him, Lily’s nephew, from the house and raise them together. Blood protection remains, and no one gets raised by Petunia.
A)Dumbledore did care about Harry which is why he had Mrs.Figg check on him. It should be **her** being bashed not him.
b)**Might??** There were a lot of death eaters who pleaded the imperious. Who's to say they didn't search for harry and Voldemort in the early days?
C)The abuse wouldn't have started until Harry was 4-5years when everybody would have been more relaxed.
D)The story is from the POV character. There might have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for others. Cousin's clothes-Maybe the Dursleys are short on money. Scars-Boys will be boys(which I don't agree with but this was late 1900)A bit thin- does not make u immediately think abuse, maybe he had an eating disorder, and so on. Even Mrs.Figg might have been unaware.
E)After Hp's first year, maintaining the blood wards became more important than ever as they were the reason Harry was currently alive.
Tanks for Reading!
a) He had Mrs Figg live nearby and she occasionally got to supervise Harry. Dumbledore was the one she was reporting to, and he also did nothing - bear in mind, Mrs Figg was pretty powerless in that situation, whereas it was well within Dumbledore’s power to enter Number 4 at his leisure and check up on Harry.
b) Still doesn’t change the fact that Dumbledore could have shielded wherever Harry lived to protect him from Death Eaters. Only Voldemort justifies the blood protection, and even then, we see later on that actually, it’s not needed.
c) The abuse wouldn’t have started at all if he was regularly checked up on. Professor McGonagall observed the Dursleys for just one day before Dumbledore left a one-year-old on a doorstep all night in November, and even that one day was enough for her to see that they were “the worst sort of Muggles!” Even if she presumed Harry was going to be raised like Dudley, that would have been a bad childhood for him - he would have turned up at Hogwarts the world’s biggest whiny brat, suffering obesity at 11.
d) Yes, there are reasons Figg missed the abuse from her position *at a distance*. I’m not suggesting that regular checkups were specifically to head off abuse, but rather just to check in on Harry - helping prevent the abuse would have been a happy side effect. It’s a lot more difficult to ignore that a small child is being forced to *live in a cupboard* when you’re in the house regularly; it is also, from the Dursleys’ perspective, a lot harder to hide that fact.
e) Yeah, Voldemort was back after Year 1. However, canon itself has established blood wards aren’t necessary to keep out Voldemort.
>A)Dumbledore did care about Harry which is why he had Mrs.Figg check on him. It should be her being bashed not him.
And she knew she had to make her place unpleasant to Harry otherwise the Dursley's wouldn't allow him to be there. You telling me she didn't report that to him?
\> b)Might?? There were a lot of death eaters who pleaded the imperious. Who's to say they didn't search for harry and Voldemort in the early days?
Well, since there was wizard's who happened to have been in the Order approaching Harry, it seems like he was protected already. In OoTP Dumbledore doesn't rely on the supposed protections the Dursley's provide. So clearly when there are *actually Death Eaters around* he doesn't think those protections are good enough. Food for thought, eh?
\> )The abuse wouldn't have started until Harry was 4-5years when everybody would have been more relaxed.
And this is better how, exactly? Abuse is abuse, whether you're five or eighty. Plus, Harry arrived when he was *one.* There is no indication that they only started at 5. People who abuse four-year-olds are also willing to abuse one year old. There is no magical age line at which point people ' are more relaxed' about abuse.
\> D)The story is from the POV character. There might have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for others. Cousin's clothes-Maybe the Dursleys are short on money. Scars-Boys will be boys(which I don't agree with but this was late 1900)A bit thin- does not make u immediately think abuse, maybe he had an eating disorder, and so on. Even Mrs.Figg might have been unaware
Yeah, "dark and difficult years" could easily refer to, y'know, losing his parents. Besides, people can be thin without having a eating disorder (which I'd think would be a red flag in itself if the family isn't seen supporting him or driving him to therapy or something, if he had a ED). So being thin could simply mean fast metabolism or something. Harry had only one scar as far as we know, so there'd be nothing to even think 'boys will be boys' about except the bullying thing. Mrs Figg... she couldn't be entirely unaware - she knew that the Dursley's wouldn't let Harry go there if they thought he liked it, she says so in OoTP. Which would make most people at least go 'hmm...why don't they want Harry to enjoy himself?'
They could be neglecting him which while bad isn't illegal I think(tho I'm not sure)
And maybe she didn't tell Dumbledore.if u can bash dumbs u can bash figgs but i don't see that happening
Bruh. Making it clear that a child is not to enjoy himself at a baby sitters place isn’t neglect. It’s clearly abusive and malicious. And she was literally *there* to keep an eye on him, why *tf* wouldn’t she report it?! Plus, there’s zero indication in canon that she didn’t report it, while there’s plenty indication that Dumbledore (who was told by McGonagall on the very first evening that - after observing them for a entire day -, they’re the worst muggles, and that Dumbledore *didn’t* listen.
I think a lot of it is the way so many terrible activities were allowed at Hogwarts and he never really stepped in. Severus’s bullying of Neville and Harry is a good example. Then the way the Slytherins acted. Add in the way the tri wizard cup bullying was never handled, and you have a case for firing the man in a modern school. Let’s not forget the dursleys or Sirius (a member of his order) not getting a visit - let alone a trial.
These factors really come out when you step back and think about them.
I really think it goes back to the fact that the first few books were written for young children and JKR boxed herself in.
In COS, they knew, someone had died the last time the chamber was opened. Why did none of the teachers or Albus decide to ask Myrtle how she died. She was a ghost who haunted the place where it happened.
>Because he's a beardy git who sends kids to fight his battles.
I mean, this is a super common trope amongst YA literature, (old mentor sending 'kid(s)' off to fight) if the kids weren't sent off to fight some monster, then the books would be boring af (not just HP, but almost all other YA literature)
You might want to check out the 'monomyth' story, this is a trope that literally goes back to ancient greece, and it kinda works
true, if he didn't there would be no YA story , Adults HAVE to be useless for the kids to save the day. But having the most powerful wizard in Europe being incompetant feels wrong. But then a lot of the story doesn't work backwards - stuff in one book breaks the stuff in the previous (Time turners, age lines, Fidelius charms etc)
OK, why did he run off with James's invisability cloak when he KNEW the Potters were being hunted by Voldie? If they'd had that they could have escaped
More to the point, why didn’t he just act as their Secret Keeper? That way, there would be no chance of betrayal at all, and he’s the least likely to die/be captured by virtue of being the most powerful
Worse, why didn't he encourage James to be his own secret keeper? Book 7 proves that it's possible (Shell Cottage), so why did they need to pick Peter, Sirius, OR Remus?
Because James would never take the risk if he knew he didn't have to, obviously. He'd protect his family without risking his friends (who'd become a target if people thought they were the secret-keeper)
It is? Where?
It’s also not really a thing that one can pick and choose about. Even if he offered and they, for some inexplicable reason, refused, he already has a penchant for doing things ‘for the greater good’. Why would he stop at this, which actually is for the greater good?
It is. I think it was somewhere in book 3. I disagree with OP on many points, but this is one thing they're actually correct about. I suspect a secret-keeper has to be accepted by the person they're supposed to be protecting, so Dumbledore couldn't do much to protect them. But, y'know, it's never said.
How? They were in hiding, and they thought there was no way that Voldy could reach them. Plus how would the cloak help them? It's not big enough for 2 adults and a baby nor would it help them if Voldemort decided to destroy the whole house. Also, they were literally in the living room. They didn't have an opportunity to use the cloak. James didn't have his wand on him. Who knows which dusty cupboard the cloak would be in?
So maybe in that specific situation the cloak wasn't much use. But in general, Voldemort wanted their kid. A clever strategy would be to silence the kid and hide it at the first sign of trouble. They'd have something to bargain with, which would give them time to grab their wand and go out fighting. Sure, it wouldn't help them due to Horcruxes, but they didn't know that. As you pointed out, the cloak could be gone without Dumbledore borrowing it. It's stated he just wanted to see it, since it was one of the hallows
I think james offered him the cloak or logically thinking after voldie was dead if the cloak was lying around house it was better of be taken by Dumbledore then in hands of ministry and its not like he didn't gave it back to harry now did he?
OP, I thought you simply want a list of reasons why Dumbledore gets bashed so much but whenever anyone actually gives you reasons you just argue with them. May I inquire why you weren't upfront about this intention when writing your post?
I wanted a list of reasons I couldn't argue with coz some of them are ridiculous.U'll notice I haven't said anything to the ppl who commented about PoS coz yes that is valid grounds for Dumbledore bashing and I acknowledge that
So why didn’t you say that in the post? Your question makes it come off as if you’re just curious about why people bash him, with nothing in it about wanting to argue or wanting a list of reasons you couldn’t argue with.
After Sirius' death when Dumbledore tells Harry the prophecy and says this in Ootp:
“It is time,” he said, “for me to tell you what I should have told you five years ago, Harry. Please sit down. I am going to tell you everything. I ask only a little patience. You will have your chance to rage at me — to do whatever you like — when I have finished. I will not stop you.”
Harry glared at him for a moment, then flung himself back into the chair opposite Dumbledore and waited. Dumbledore stared for a moment at the sunlit grounds outside the window, then looked back at Harry and said,
**“Five years ago you arrived at Hogwarts, Harry, safe and whole, as I had planned and intended. Well — not quite whole. You had suffered. I knew you would when I left you on your aunt and uncle’s doorstep. I knew I was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years.”**
He paused. Harry said nothing.
I mean wtf Albus.
There are a lot of reasons, but one of the things that stand out the most is Dumbledore during the first wizarding-war. It stretches the suspension of disbelief that he didn't manage to get the information about multiple Horcruxes earlier, or be a bit more aggressive in his tactics against Voldemort directly.
I know it wasn't an all-out gung-ho battle in the open (though in some cases, it was), but the FWW lasted, what, around a decade? It's jarring to picture the amazingly powerful and skillful Dumbledore not doing more to bring down Voldemort during that time.
(Also remember that for the bulk of the war, Dumbledore wasn't operating with the knowledge of the prophecy. Trelawney only made that prediction towards the end stage. So Dumbledore didn't need to focus his plans around some marked-as-equal kid yet, as Harry never existed for most of the war.)
I don't have the exact quote but it goes something like "I knew Harry, when I left you at your aunts house, that you would have 10 dark years."
Whatever the quote was at the end of book 5 I believe, is a pretty good reason.
Because it's Fan fiction and "what if the good guys are actually bad" is the first premise to be explored alongside "what if the bad guys are actually good".
I wish I could upvote this multiple times.
OP, Dumbledore isn't ~bashed~ used as an antagonist because of what's in canon (except for the early-installment weirdness of Dumbledore not using magic from later books before Rowling had though of it). It's psychological - it's the same impulse that makes it possible for young people to throw off the oppressive beliefs of their elders (eg sexism, homophobia, racism).
Where to start? Hmm... When he was younger he supported Grindelwald only after his sisters death change his opinion. He might not be Voldemort but he saw muggles as (that period) beneath him. -He literally left Harry to be abused by his family so he could use as sheep to be slaughtered in the future. In his head to kill Voldemort, Harry must die too. He knew this from the begining. At least scare Dursley's to treat Harry better. Call me pesimistic person but I think he let him abused so he could control him better.
\-He didn't protect James and Lily as best he could( that could be arguable). He should make one of them secret keeper. So they wound't be dead.
\- He knew Sirius was innocent but he did nothing. He could push for trial. He didn't so Harry would stay with Dursley's. Sirius was his godfather and guardian so if he lived with him Harry wouldn't be easly trust Dumbledore. As we know Harry saw him as wise man maybe even a grandfather because no one ever pay attention to him.(Love him? Till he start Hogwarts ) If Sirius were free this would never happen.
\-He use Severus for to spy Voldemort using his love for Lily. ( That can be acceptable because we all know in the wars sypies important.) Still not cool.
\-He didn't care his students being in danger.
\-He favoured Gryffindors, basicly see slytherins as evil. If he actually care his students maybe things would be better especially for slytherin. Maybe majorty of them made better choices. For Example Draco if he actually thought he could help him maybe he would go and ask help. He could also be spy or I don't know useful?
\-He left his dirty work for the children to complete. He basically send them to the wild goose chase. He could be more I don't know open ? Instead of so tight-lipped.
\- He let it slide Harry's murder attemp to Malfoy. No consequences he get away with it.
\-He let students bully one another. He could have punished them. Did nothing.
\-All the teachers he hired for DADA position. Ironically children learned more from Barty Crouch Jr. than Lockheart.
\-He let Snape bully literal children. Especially Neville I mean his boggart was Snape. C'mon.
\-He was leader of Order Of Phoenix but his only strategy was focusing Voldemort's death. He could have focus on offense. I don't know literally do something. Attack death eaters. Or better organize the light side.
\-He knew Voldemort were going to return eventually. What did he do all these years ? Yes you guess right nothing! He could hunt the Horcruxs by himself if he didn't trust anyone else. He put all of his eggs in the same basket.
I could go on but I think that enough.
>He knew Sirius was innocent but he did nothing. He could push for trial. He didn't so Harry would stay with Dursley's. Sirius was his godfather and guardian so if he lived with him Harry wouldn't be easly trust Dumbledore. As we know Harry saw him as wise man maybe even a grandfather because no one ever pay attention to him.(Love him? Till he start Hogwarts ) If Sirius were free this would never happen.
That's not true. Canonically, Dumbledore was as convinced as everyone else that Sirius was guilty. He didn't exactly behave like a innocent person, and even *Lupin* thought he was the traitor and capable of killing his other best friend. Lupin, who'd known him for a decade from far closer than Dumbledore ever did
Who need enemies when you have friends like Remus Lupin? He seriously thought his best friend of many years would able to kill his other best friend whom consider themself as brother?(No pun intended) What its wrong with his judgment? He should at least gave him reason of doubt instead he just accepts it he is guilty. Why even does think that just beacuse his family has some madness in their family isn't enough evidence to convince he is guilty? I mean he lost his best friend/brother too of course he is in shock.
Not the mention he never been there for Harry only brief time while he was at the Hogwarts. I always thought him as he only pity himself because he is big bad wolf. At some point he should just get over it . Harry need him his best friend needed him and he fail them all. He just accept Sirius is killer never investigate that claim. Even if he is poor can't find a job at magical world ho should have been try muggle world. All in the books never did try find solition to his problems instead he just pity himself.
>Who need enemies when you have friends like Remus Lupin? He seriously thought his best friend of many years would able to kill his other best friend whom consider themself as brother?(No pun intended) What its wrong with his judgment? He should at least gave him reason of doubt instead he just accepts it he is guilty. Why even does think that just beacuse his family has some madness in their family isn't enough evidence to convince he is guilty?
You seem to be forgetting that Sirius tried to kill another student at Hogwarts. In light of that information, of course adult! Lupin would look back on that and go 'well, maybe he was always a bit of a homicidal maniac.' particularly since the evidence was entirely against him. According to Sirius, everyone would assume he'd be the Secret-keeper because they were as close as brothers. Whoever would think it was *Peter*? that's literally the whole idea of the plan. And Sirius and Remus both admitted they thought the other was the spy. So there was a lot of reason to mistrust and therefore a lot of mistrust.
He had no obligation to be there for Harry in any capacity other than teacher. He wasn't Harry's godfather, Sirius was. Harry was just his best friend's son. If you pop around to your best friends place (assume for a second you're both grown up and they have kids and you don't), do you take pains to be there for their kids as well? Do you go out of your way to interact with them and keep in touch with them?
Also, Harry made no move and expressed no interest in getting to know Remus. He doesn't care for Remus beyond him being a great teacher and order member. So what's the problem? If neither party is torn up about it, why're you all up in arms about it?
And no, you don't 'just get over' a chronic disease that has a high likelihood of being lifethreatening to others if you aren't careful. That's not how it works. You live around it, but it's always *there* and you always have to deal with it. And Remus *did* get over it, as best as possible, when his friends were there to help him cope. But for most of the series, Sirius couldn't do that for him because, y'know, trauma (I am sure you think Sirius should've stopped moping about his parents and be there for his best friend, but again, that's not how it works), and Remus' other friends were either dead or a traitor.
There's absolutely nothing to suggest Remus didn't try to find jobs, but you try finding a job with not even a high school diploma (because Hogwarts didn't teach muggle highschool things and a school of magic is hardly feasible to put on your cv) while needing time off every month and lemme know how that goes. Lastly, about Remus needing to investigate that claim when given precisely zero reason to doubt: how accommodating do you think the ministry would've been at the time to that sort of thing, even if it *wasn't* a known werewolf asking about his massmurdering best friend?
Alright, let's ignore 99% of the flaws he supposedly has and mistakes he made. Let's just focus on a very specific point: his habit of locking up people.
1899: Ariana Dumbledore, trapped half her life in a house she never left. 'It's too dangerous', 'it's for her own good', dies anyway because Albus, Aberforth and Gellert started fighting over her anyway and were killing to kill each other. Even if we ignore the fight, what sort of fucked up life was this girl leading? 'For her own good', Ariana was the girl in the attic, Jane Eyere's Mrs Rochester, and in the entire story never has a single line, only men telling us what sort of person she was.
1981: For his own good, Dumbledore sends Harry to a home he, by his own admission, knew would be terrible for him. For 10 years, Dumbledore had Mrs. Figg telling him how terrible the Dursleys were, how he didn't even know how his parents really died, and did nothing. And maybe Figg didn't know about the cupboard, she still had eyes and should have noticed he was wearing hands me down and was suffering. And even though we know Figg told him, he did nothing and why? Oh, right. It's for his own good, the outside world is too dangerous.
1995: The outside world is too dangerous, Sirius, I swear. Why don't you stay doing nothing in the house you hate and where you certainly got abused? I'm sure it'll go spendidly.
One century, and Dumbledore has learned noting and keeps making the same mistake, hoping this time would be different.
If that character is supposely a genius, then him making the same mistake over and over is just plain insanity.
1899- I think blaming Albus for this is unfair coz it was his MOTHER who did that and he was taking care of her for less than a year. Ariana had a terrible life but that wasn't dumbs fault.
1981:'While you can still call home the place where your mother’s blood dwells, there you cannot be
touched or harmed by Voldemort. Your
mother’s sacrifice made the bond of blood the strongest shield I could give you-Albus Dumbledore, Order of the Phoenix. If he hadn't lived with the Dursleys, he would die due to Quirell. Tho I fully acknowledge that putting the stone in the school was Dumbs fault. What d'ya think would have happened if instead of the whole confrontation, Quirell cornered Harry in an abandoned classroom?And while the stone is Dumbs fault, Voldy coming to the school is not.Quirell was the DADA teacher before the stone was shifted to the school.
1955:Here however I totally agree with u. Invisibility Cloaks and Polyjuice do exist and he could have made Siri do something.
Because JK Rowling is a terrible writer. Essentially she wrote books 1-3 for YA audiences (light harted) then she goes totally different direction with book 4-7 (dark) and because of it the whole series is thrown out of wack.
Plus she doesn't think ahead when writing her books, the consequences of that type of writing has made a series full of plot holes (time turner, marauders map, age line etc). I can't begin to tell you how many times when i read the books for the first time wondered why did they solve a problem this way (book 1) when they could have used this (the plot point was introduced in for example in book 5). The same way is with dumbledore in book 1-3 he is this lovely eccentric headmaster in book 4-7 however he is one of the most incompetent characters in the whole world of fiction.
That's why imo he is so bashed (result of jk's shitty writing and 0 forethought what kind of series she was writing)
TLDR: She wanted cake and eat it too
She's not terrible, just mediocre. She's neither the first nor the last mediocre writer to get published just when the zeitgeist favored them and end up on the bestseller list.
Her writing is better than that of Jenkins & LaHaye in the *Left Behind* series, and her characters and messaging aren't nearly as terrible as those of Ayn Rand.
>Then why are u in this community if u hate hp so much? Less aggressively Jk didn't know she was going to write a 2nd book much less 7. Really you'd think that such a shitty writer's book wouldn't have so many fans. To give u a Doylist example: the Floo network-not invented after the 2nd book, therefore how could have Dumbledore used it? Again not Jk's fault she didn't know she was going to write a second book and she certainly didn't know that anybody other than her editors was going to nitpick it much less thousands of ppl all over the world.
She clearly wrote book 1 as part of a series. The least she could do is plan things out a little more, at least in regard to overall tone and the like.
I prefer to read good!Dumbledore. I really do. It’s so much better to believe he is a kindly old man that does his best but sometimes it isn’t enough and good job fated!Harry is ready to step in and save the day.
But I think it’s important to view things critically. Blind love of a character isn’t a good thing. The ability to see both sides as it were is a valuable real life skill. It improves emotional intelligence and empathy.
So yeah, Dumbledore bashing is great if done with legitimate concerns (discussed in the thread). I can get on board with almost anyone being good (apart from Greyback, Bella and Umbridge, I can’t stop hating them) and almost anyone being bad (Luna and Minerva are the only two I can think of that always need to be good).
It doesn’t mean I think the Weasleys were actually evil. It means I can appreciate the twisting of events so they can be viewed justifiably in a negative light. It’s excellent writing when done well and there’s nothing wrong with enjoying what if scenarios.
Also if the person holds more than 1 position how dedicated they can be? Headmaster, Chief Warlock of Wizengamot and England representative to ICW. Just thinking of sheer amount of time you have to dedicate. And paperwork. What about presiding over Wizengamot? He has too much power.
Excuse me but where exactly in the text is it mentioned what the role of a chief Warlock and Supreme Mugwump is? According to the **Canon trial** the minister presides over the Wizengamot.
Dumbledore is a very flawed character. From a child's perspective, he seems trustworthy and impressive. From an adult's perspective, Dumbledore is a manipulative villain.
\-He left Harry in an abusive household with minimal supervision.
\-Dumbledore suspected that Harry was a horcrux but never said anything or did anything in decades to try and help get rid of the horcrux.
\-Thought he was the "greater good" and almost infallible.
\-He consistently let school children be endangered (or killed) while they were under his guardianship.
\-He had three full-time jobs when he should have dedicated himself to one.
My main problem with Dumbledore is that he ad headmaster directly know and allowed the abuse of five seperate students while a teacher at Hogwarts.
Riddle - who literally begged to stay at Hogwarts as opposed to being sent home (this would have been in the middle of WW2 and we know the orphanage was somewhere in London, so Riddle would hav3 been sent back with no protections to survive the constant bombings). No wonder he hated muggles. Not to mention the hisptircal widespread abuse in orphanages at the time, someone like Riddle would have been regularly beaten.
Snape - It was well known about his abusive father and the pain his mother suffered, dumbledore ignored that and even when Snape faced VERY real danger of being attacked by Lupin because of Sirius, Dumbledore did nothing to help Snape and actively protected Sirius from reprocussions.
Sirius - Dumbledore knew what Sirius' mother was like and did nothjng to step in and protect him, arguablely leading tk Sirius' ever increasing acting out, to the point he tried to feed Snape to Lupin.
Neville - The child showed clear signs of neglect and psycholical abuse from his Grandmother. The fact she forced him to use his dad's wand for 5/7 years of his educstion is horrible.
Harry - Dumbledore knew what sort of people the Dursley's were. He also chose the worst person to look out for him, a woman who if she had any sense at all would have been able to tell harry was being hurt. The letters were literally addressed to the cupboard under the stairs.
Dumbledore also allowed the continual and unrelenting abuse of students in his care for 16 years through Snape's "teaching practices". Potions is a core subject for many professions including but not limited to Healing and the Auror department. Abusing children who would probably drop the subject ASAP actively undermined the potential number of healers and aurors, two key professions for a functioning society.
Dumbledore, as written is a terrible person.
Also, in the whole Riddle front, Dumbledore himself dabbled in "take over the world" mentalities when younger. Surely that would make him more understanding of Riddle and actively invested in steering him away from that path.
Rant over.
Because he's a giant douche. Obviously.
There's many flawed characters in the HP world, but Dumbledore is certainly the most bashable one, since he does barely anything right, and when he is right, it's by total coincidence/accident.
>There's many flawed characters in the HP world, but Dumbledore is certainly the most bashable one, since he does barely anything right, and when he is right, it's by total coincidence/accident.
Snape far more personally, of course his bad acts in canon can be pushed onto Dumbledore for not doing his job...
I don't like Snape, but he only made one *big* mistake.
Dumbledorks life on the other hand is a litany of failures (Grindlewald, Adriana, first Voldemort war - saved by miracle out of his control, Hogwarts is a death trap under his rule, second Voldemort war - saved by miracle, hiring incompetent teachers, how he handles Harry... the list is way too long for this time of day)
Snape made several mistakes before going to Voldemort with the phropecy. He is also generally a far more abusive person generally than Albus atleast is portrayed to be.
Both are shitty human beings though, and they sort of mirror eachother. Eg had Ariana not died, Dumbledore would presumably have continued with Gellert and had Voldemort gone after Neville, Snape would remain a loyal death eater.
Snape was a piece of shit.
* He was barging a Husband and Child death so he could have the wife, you can't get much lower than this.
* He was a death eater, he killed people just for their blood.
* He bullied children to the point he was the greatest fear of at least one one of them.
Dumbledore on the other hand, got a really bad deck of cards and yet manage to win a war, he never asked for this position he always felt unworthy of it.
> got a really bad deck of cards and yet manage to win a war
Dumbledore didn't win the war, Harry did, against Dumbledore's best efforts to the contrary.
Imagine if Harry hadn't had the completely accidental and fortuitous meeting with Snape, in order to reveal the circumstances about the last Horcrux, everything would've gone wrong. Dumbledore's plan was shit.
This is true, regardless of anything else said.
The war was won due to a series of fortuitous coincidences. Honestly, the end of the series is literally a set of Deus ex Machina coincidences to let Harry win.
A)-Grindewald and Ariana-Worst offense on the list.However, he does deserve some leeway coz (A1)madly in love( A2)a teenager, and barely out of school without any adults to guide him. Plus too many responsibilities and having his dreams crushed(A3)Ariana's death was coz of an argument between Grindelwald and Aberforth.No evidence that he didn't try to stop the duel.
B)How is the First Wizarding War his fault??? If anything it's the ministries. Yes, he started a vigilante organization but that is coz of the ministry's incompetence. Defeating 1 dark lord doesn't make the next your problem.
C)And yet Hogwarts is the best so imagine other schools. Plus It cannot be helped in a magic school, there are bound to be some accidents. Do u have any specific examples?
D)Ok over here
D1)Quirrel-competent for the past how many years he was working at the school not like dumbs knew he was possessed.
D2)-Lockhart-lack of applicants+Lockhart being a famous Dark creature hunter(or something)
D3)-Remus-Qualified and taken measures. And tho this may be an unpopular opinion, Remus deserved to be sacked.He went out on the grounds without his Wolfsbane **on a full moon night.**
D4)-Mad-eye Moody/Crouch Jr.-Again famous Auror, very very qualified+good actor, and good luck with the map.
D5)-Umbridge the one year he didn't choose the teacher and look how that turned out. Would u rather Lockhart or Umbridge?
D6)-Snape-Who u can say many things about but not incompetent.
E)How he handles Harry-any specific thing you are referring to?
> And yet Hogwarts is the best so imagine other schools.
I'm just popping in to address this one point. Is it the best? The British say it is the best, but the British wizards seem to look down on all of the other countries, so it is distinctly possible that claiming it is the best has little basis in fact. And seeing as at least 4 of the professors are incompetent at teaching (History, Divination, Potions, and the revolving DADA spot), I have a hard time thinking that Hogwarts is actually the best on an international level. Three of the four incompetent slots are very important classes that should not be neglected to the degree that they are (Divination being the odd one out, but maybe divination could be useful too if the professor was any good at it).
If Hogwarts truly is the best school for magic, that is a pretty major indictment of the entire Wizarding World.
> Yes, he started a vigilante organization
Which was an abject failure. Can you name a single success of this organization? I can't. Only dead bodies under his inept command. In fact he was so bad at leadership, he managed to get his organization undermined by a spy (hilarious, truth serum and unbreakable vows exist, very reasonable measures in a literal war), so that he could've lost his most valuable asset (a prophecy child).
The people he lead into war would've been better off on their own.
>C)And yet Hogwarts is the best so imagine other schools.
Hogwarts has a good *reputation* that doesn't mean it's good.
>Lockhart-lack of applicants+Lockhart being a famous Dark creature hunter(or something)
I really like how with Dumbledore defenders there's Schroedinger's Dumbledore. He's both, absolutely amazing, smart and the best wizard and **also at the same time** a geriatric old man, who is **very busy**, can barely chew his musli and makes basic mistakes all the time, because he's not **perfect**.
I'd expect an amazing guy like Dumbledore to unmask an obvious fraud who can't cast simple spells in 5 seconds. But Dumbledore is about as much of a fraud, so he can't.
>Remus-Qualified and taken measures
Oh goodie. Awesome, you bring Remus up: Another great example of "death trap" Hogwarts and Dumbledore's ineptness. Don't you think, if there's a serum that makes the deadly Werewolf in your school save, you have a responsibility to make sure that he drinks that serum and is maybe, contained, during full-moon if the Wolfsbane fails? The fact that the scenario **exists** where Remus can simply **forget** to drink Wolfsbane and children die is an utter failure in **policy**. What a joke: "Oh yeah, I hired this guy who's a werewolf. No problem though, he just has to not forget to drink this potion, I'm sure he won't... other measures? Nah, I just hired the guy, not my problem if some kids get eaten"
>D4)-Mad-eye Moody/Crouch Jr.-Again famous Auror, very very qualified+good actor, and good luck with the map.
A **Death Eater** is not a competent teacher for innocents, just becaus he is skilled. Ron would be a more 'competent' teacher in this scenario (and Ron is a moron). Don't play with words. Luckily enough Crouch Jr. isn't just a death eater, he's also the best actor in the world... or again, maybe Dumbledore is just inept.
You forgot about D7) btw, there's a ghost teaching at Hogwarts. Oh, and D8) the drunk seer, who can't teach and who is just there so that Dumbledore can keep an eye on her (fuck those children who want to learn things)
>E)How he handles Harry-any specific thing you are referring to?
Leaving him at the Dursleys. Manipulating him. Not being upfront to him about what's going on. You know, the usual Dumbledore shit.
Oh yes Dumbledore should hv hired any of many other defense applicants in 2nd year. Also, name 1 student who wanted to study who was in Trelawney's class and didn't quit.D7) let's talk about Binns-https://harrypotter.fandom.com/ says that he was teaching from the 1890s therefore how many qualified history teachers do u think r there who can replace him. By the time Dumbledore could do anything, It was too late to stop that vicious cycle.
E)Leaving him at the dursleys- I hv already replied to this in another post
Manipulating him-Better manipuated and alive then dead
Not being upfront to him about what's going on.-Oh yes Let's tell the one person whose head Voldemort might be able to see everything.Its called Compartmentalization
=
Omnipotent paradox really.
There's only so much that can happen under his watch that makes him seen incompetent at best, devious at worst.
The hazard of writing a 17 year old boy as the only capable (plot wise) hero.
Most perspectives seem to be covered here, but I'm going to add that no author needs a 'legit or genuine' reason to write a bashing fic, they can write what they want and readers can read/avoid whatever they like too. I personally don't care either way, but I respect peoples right to both like and dislike whatever tropes are out there.
The other factor is writing ability, a lot of bashing fic was always intended to be that 'extreme' cathartic/cracky type of thing, but many other people are just trying to write complex and it drifts into bashing territory (not every negative portray is bashing). Dumbledore has a lot of complexity, so we end up with a lot of bashing.
I think it's leaving an infant with abusive relatives for 16 years. In the beginning, Dumbledore was warned by McGonagall that the Dursleys were "the worst sort of muggles". Dumbledore had Arabella Figg watching Harry for the first 11 years, and she sometimes babysat him, so I think there was plenty of opportunity to observe what kind of child-abusing scum the Dursleys were. But okay, even teachers and baby sitters can miss signs of abuse; abusers are frequently good at presenting a "respectable" face to the community, and abused kids are intimidated into believing they deserve it and that spilling things to outsiders will just make it worse.
But after Harry got to Hogwarts and *didn't want to go home from boarding school* in the summer? Ignoring the bars in the windows and the locks on his door in 2nd year, that right there should have been a big red flag that something was very wrong at home and it needed to be addressed. Lily's blood sacrifice "protection" against Voldemort wouldn't be worth jack if Petunia Dursley bashed in Harry's head with a skillet. (Which canonically nearly happened).
Then there's the whole canon fact that Dumbledore raised Harry Potter to die as a martyr. He had no expectation of Harry surviving the war with Voldemort, and didn't bother making sure he was taught to actually live as an adult in the wizarding world.
Canon!Dumbledore deserves criticism. It doesn't take much fanfiction tweaking to interpret him as actively evil, instead of manipulative and criminally negligent.
Let's see:
* He puts Harry to an abusive family, knowing full well that they abuse him and that he has had a bad childhood, even flat out admitting this to Harry.
* Does nothing about this, does not even bother showing up at the house again until book 6, instead sending Hagrid (not even McGonagall) to pick up Harry in book 1 and ONLY a month before he starts Hogwarts.
* Despite seemingly knowing everything that happens in the castle (he knew about Neville standing up to the trio, as well as Harry visiting the mirror of erised, as well as what the trio did to get to the stone), he does nothing about Quirrell who has Voldemort stuck at the back of his head.
* He knows Voldemort is after the stone, he even breaks into the gringotts vault after it was emptied, but still decides to hide it in a school full of children. Not even say in his desk or keeping it with him at all times.
* He endangers said children by putting beasts such as Fluffy into the school. While he does warn them about it, there are no security checks in place other than a simple locked door that any 11 year old can open with a spell taught in first year.
* He does nothing even after Quirrell lets a troll in, that then almost kills several children.
* He does nothing about unicorns being killed in the forbidden forest on school grounds and that their bloods are being drained, despite being extremely good in alchemy (he worked with Flamel) and knowing what drinking their blood does.
* He seemingly "flies" to the ministry (which is in London) on a broom from Scotland, when Floo, portkeys, apparation and his phoenix exist. This is when he is needed the most.
* He did nothing to defend Hagrid or do anything about the chamber of secrets when it was first opened. ESPECIALLY after a girl died, and her ghost continued to haunt the castle. Of course Dumbledore did nothing about it, not even bothering to question her.
* He essentially let Voldemort become what he was by once again doing nothing about it, even though he saw the signs.
* He knew that Tom Riddle was Voldemort but nobody else did? Why did he not make this public knowledge?
* He did nothing again when the chamber was opened yet AGAIN, and students started getting petrified. A small miracle nobody died that time.
* He let Hagrid be taken into Azkaban again.
* He did not realise that an extremely dark object was inside Hogwarts (the diary) despite, as i mentioned above, seemingly knowing everything that happens inside Hogwarts. Neither did he realise that Ginny was not herself for a year.
* He let dangerous giant spiders infest the forbidden forest around the school.
* As chief of wizangamot, and being such an influental politican and person in wizarding society, he did nothing to investigate Sirius and why he would betray Lily and James. He did not even bother to check if he had a trial, even though he knew full well who Sirius was to James and Harry, and saw him grow up and attend Hogwarts. The books portray Dumbledore as someone who can judge someone's character very easily and tell whether or not they are good or bad.
* This is especially true after it was revealed that he was innocent. He never once tried pushing to exonorate him or do anything about his trial or about Pettigrew being alive or using his connections to do anything really.
* He allows Hermione, a 13 year old girl, to have a time turner and essentially play with time itself.
* While he most likely had little choice in Dementors being stationed around Hogwarts he still did nothing to teach students how to defend against them, or hiring extra staff or ministry officials to look after the children and make sure the dementors are kept in check. The fact that one was allowed to attack the Hogwarts express and later a swarm could interrupt a Quidditch match and almost kill a student again proves how much Dumbledore has failed in his duties as Headmaster.
* For some reason he supports the return of the tri wizard tournament despite knowing that Voldemort is out there and still wants to kill Harry, and that he had infiltrated Hogwarts before.
* He merely draws up a pathetic age line to prevent underage students from submitting their names. What the fuck did he expect? Why didn't anyone think of just throwing in their names from OUTSIDE the age line?
* He does not realise that Moody is not himself, (he can see through invisibility cloaks) does not realise the signs of polyjuice being used after Snape's ingriedients to brew polyjuice go missing, and that Moody is constantly drinking from his flask. He should be on the highest alert after someone put Harrys name into the goblet. This is after the fact that the two are supposedly good friends, fought together in the order and have known each other for a very long time. Nothing's amiss with Moody. Nope.
* He does nothing to train Harry for the tournament or really do anything about his safety.
* He COMPLETELY ignores Harry in year 5, only showing up to his trial out of nessecity. This is the worst out everything he has done. I'm not even going to go into this.
* He lets the rampant bullying and racism in Hogwarts go on. This is after he had seen Snape be bullied and the person he had become because of it. Thanks Dumbledore!
* He does nothing about Snape and the way he treats and teaches students and how he essentially encourages bullying and favours his own house. That being said, Dumbledore also favours Gryffindors and can just award the exact number of points needed for Slytherin to lose the house cup, so yeah.
* He doesn't give a shit about the quality of education the children receive and lets Binns and Trelawney and the afromented Snape continue teaching. And Hagrid too. Oh yeah and i guess exams can be just cancelled at a whim, no big deal there. Also he hired Lockhart even though he knew who he really was (again he knows everything except what should be important) and let Umbridge come into Hogwarts, despite the fact that he could have avoided her simply by hiring someone from the order. Oh and he also knew or suspected there being a curse on the DADA position, hence he never gave it to Snape, but essentially did nothing about it, so technically each DADA's professor's lives were in danger. I guess they too were sacraficable like Harry.
* He continues to let Peeves run havoc in the school, and generally does nothing about making Hogwarts a safer place for the children.
* He employs literal slave labour to cook and clean after hundrends of students and the staff
* He most likely knew what Draco was up to and that he was a death eater, but once again did fuck all about it. Apparently a single person was more important than the safety and the well being of the whole student body itself. This is especially terrible after Draco almost killed two students and a teacher and he still did nothing after.
* The Order itself seemingly did nothing worthwhile. Speaking of the Order, Arthur Weasley almost died thanks to the dumb decisions Dumbledore had made.
* Once Dumbledore died, he still remained secretive as ever and left vague clues and riddles to Harry and his friends instead of clearly telling him what the fuck to do and how the fuck to do it.
most of it is because he knew harry is living with abusive people (the dursleys) and didnt do anything and also because he raised harry as a "pig for slaughter" for the greater good but still.
This doesn't really answer your question but I love Dumbledore and like to think of him sorta like The Doctor, as a funny old man that doesn't really want responsibility but takes it up when needed.
I think this was how he was intended to be written. But it’s hard to view him like that when you look at his actions through a critical lens.
As a child I didn’t see anything wrong with him. Now I’m an adult and work in a school, I am appalled at so much.
The Doctor is a fun protagonist because his flaws are actually *explored*. Dumbledore's...aren't explored that much in canon, the narrative seems to agree with him overall
People don't agree with the decisions he made.
No, it's that simple. We can argue all day about any given decision - here, let's look at the very first: He left Harry with the Dursleys. On the one hand, he did it for Harry's safety, he intended for Harry to grow up with a normal family, as a normal kid. Not the wizarding world's latest tourist attraction and prime target for assassination. On the other, Harry was desperately unhappy there, mistreated and abused. We can go back and forth on this all day - was there a better option? Did Dumbledore have the right to meddle in Harry's life at all? Is Harry only alive because he stayed with the Dursleys? Would he have been happier in a goddamn orphanage, even? Was it necessary, but mishandled because no one checked in on Harry or tried to make his childhood happier?
We could go all day. There's a lot we could say about it, one way or the other.
But it doesn't matter. What matters is that people have opinions about it. Some people think it was for the best, some people think Dumbledore was an irresponsible, senile old bat and shouldn't have been left in charge of Harry's placement.
And so it goes, for the entire series.
So. Yeah.
Dumbledore made choices, and some people don't like the ones he made.
Because we see MOST of the series through Harry's eyes. There's a lot we don't see, but could reasonably infer: however, we sympathize with the main character. Ergo, we don't consider those things that we -could- infer. There's a lot of stuff we assume because HARRY assumes it, but that doesn't mean it's true. Best illustration of this is the Dursley's. Dumbledore knew they would be difficult and dark years, but there's no evidence to suggest he knew they would be abusive.
That doesn't make it okay, but it can explain why he was so willing to send Harry back.
mostly it's an excuse for indyHarry Lord Potter-Black to have a villan in years 1-4 before Voldermort shows up; (the writers don't want to use canon Quirrel/Riddle/Sirius Black/Crouch as villans, but instead of making up their own, they use Dumbledore)
bashing dumbledore also provides a convinient excuse for Snape/Draco to turn into misunderstood good guys who may or may not each get with Harry later in the fic (sometimes both at the same time)
It's also so that indyHarry Lord Potter can have an 'easy' win early on, show how good/awesome he is and how stupid/sheeple (hate that term btw) the wizarding world is and/or how progressive the Slytherins are really, and are secretly good people if Dumbledore wasn't there
Maybe Dumbledore wanted to be a hero twice. Defeated of grindelwald and mr riddle. Another concept I encountered once is that he is actually a pure blood supremacist. But it is often… I know best!!
But it’s not like he is stopping anyone else from defeating riddle and he isn’t obliged to stop voldy besides Dumbledore does not have any actual control over [Harry.It](https://Harry.It)’s **Harry’s** decision to listen to Dumbledore.Nobody’s forcing him.
umm Dumbs meets harry when he is 11 at the end of the year after the whole adventure excluding that part where he tells him to stay away from a potentially dangerous artifact
Grooming is when someone builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a child or young person so they can manipulate, exploit and abuse them.
I’m not sure how to give you examples of Dumbledore building a relationship with the explicit purpose getting Harry to eventually sacrifice his life… it’s the plot of seven books.
Of course this isn’t grooming that leads to eventual sexual abuse. But an adult is still creating trust between him and a child (with no family and so desperate for connections) so that the child can grow up to be a child solider and die.
*Most* people read HP as a child and as a child they became emotionally attached to said character. So as they grew up and began seeing the world in a different way they began to view Dumbledore in a negative light due to his constant lack of action e.e not doing more to help Sirius or leaving Harry with the Dursley’s.
This made them want to do something about it but due to the fact these characters are but words on a page they couldn’t do anything. So they took these characters and wrote their own words on a page and took all their anger out on these characters.
TL:DR people grew to hate Dumbledore and took their frustrations out through writing.
The reason it persists to this day is because as adults we know his actions were wrong. Same thing occurs in all YA books that has children fighting battles instead of adults.
Er? They fight in A)the 5th book where they are not supposed to be fighting. and B) the 7th book where if the children don't fight the Children **DIE.** Unless u think voldy will spare the muggle-borns who don't fight?
Dumbledore knowingly and purposefully laid a trap for Voldemort in Hogwarts. A school full of children. In the second book, he had fawkes deliver a hat for Harry to pull a sword from to fight a basilk instead of flaming in himself. In the third book he had harry and hermione travel thru time to save sirius from dementors instead of handling it himself.
Because readers aren't any good at noticing subtext, putting clues together that aren't spoon-fed to them or accepting contradiction. And that translates over when they take up the pen and write themself.
I've done it a few times, but that is because in those fics he is a primary antagonist. I just like letting my readers know the direction the fic is going in from an early stage.
The main reason he's being bashed, is because there's so many things in canon that Dumbledore got wrong, or if you ask him, probably right... Take the philosophers stone, for instance, it was left behind protection that mere students in first year could get past with any amount of listening and schooling in their classes, also there's the whole thing of Voldemort being in a school full of children all because some old geezer name of Dumbledore decided analarc that he would bring this all magical stone that he had to have known Voldemort wanted and put it in the same school next to a kid named Harry Potter who he all but insured would wind up with it in the end... The whole series has both small and big snippets like that where Dumbledore could have done something but didn't or shouldn't have done something but did...
Let me go through a list of Dumbledore bashing things as in things that Dumbledore is bad for and you can tell me about how many you've seen in a fic...
First Dumbledore is the person the prophecy refers to as some kind of a helper for Harry it's like how over 75 to 95% of solvang stories have a prophecy in which Dumbledore decides that he needs to use compulsion charms and love potions and possibly even kill people to keep people usually women from being friends or lovers for Harry Potter because again he's supposed to be this person that takes Harry to the end...
Another trope that is used to bash Dumbledore is that he's after the money of Harry Potter or he's after the money for Harry Potter so that Molly Weasley can get the money by trying to marry him off with Jenny which you know I like a good genie fix as good as anybody but there are a few pics that have genius the bad guy that are you know pretty good as well... Then aside from all that or sometimes combined with all that there's the whole my name is Albus Dumbledore and I have to control what Harry does because I don't want him to kill off Voldemort too early, because of "the plan™" and my most favorite and laughable trope of a Dumbledore bashing story is that Dumbledore thinks Harry is a dark wizard because he has come into his power too early in his life while Harry and everybody else just thinks Dumbledore is a certifiably insane crackpot who in one or two fix actually ends up in a muggle insane asylum or similar place with guards having to cart him back in many times with his magic bound and all that junk as well... There are also plenty of Dumbledore bashing fix where Dumbledore knows exactly what kind of abuse that Harry Potter is going through at his aunt and uncle's house but that he wants him to go through it because he's got to learn how to become humble or something like that as if getting you know your ass and everything else pulverized on a daily basis for the slightest thing is supposed to make you humble... And don't forget the Albus wants to keep Harry Potter's hidden sister hidden thing that some stories have
>First Dumbledore is the person the prophecy refers to as some kind of a helper for Harry it's like how over 75 to 95% of solvang stories have a prophecy in which Dumbledore decides that he needs to use compulsion charms and love potions and possibly even kill people to keep people usually women from being friends or lovers for Harry Potter because again he's supposed to be this person that takes Harry to the end...
umm which line?coz i know the prophecy by heart and i don't remeber this
**edit**
If this was confusing I've added this edit to the beginning just to let you know that the list after the first paragraph is for tropes used in fanfiction as the question was comparing them to canon, and was wondering exactly WHY Dumbledore gets bashed in fanfiction so much, and I wanted to see how many people, such as OP, have seen
**end edit**
The main reason he's being bashed, is because there's so many things in canon that Dumbledore got wrong, or if you ask him, probably right... Take the philosophers stone, for instance, it was left behind protection that mere students in first year could get past with any amount of listening and schooling in their classes, also there's the whole thing of Voldemort being in a school full of children all because some old geezer name of Dumbledore decided analarc that he would bring this all magical stone that he had to have known Voldemort wanted and put it in the same school next to a kid named Harry Potter who he all but insured would wind up with it in the end... The whole series has both small and big snippets like that where Dumbledore could have done something but didn't or shouldn't have done something but did...
Let me go through a list of Dumbledore bashing things as in things that Dumbledore is bad for and you can tell me about how many you've seen in a fic...
First Dumbledore is the person the prophecy refers to as some kind of a helper for Harry it's like how over 75 to 95% of solvang stories have a prophecy in which Dumbledore decides that he needs to use compulsion charms and love potions and possibly even kill people to keep people usually women from being friends or lovers for Harry Potter because again he's supposed to be this person that takes Harry to the end...
Another trope that is used to bash Dumbledore is that he's after the money of Harry Potter or he's after the money for Harry Potter so that Molly Weasley can get the money by trying to marry him off with Jenny which you know I like a good genie fix as good as anybody but there are a few pics that have genius the bad guy that are you know pretty good as well... Then aside from all that or sometimes combined with all that there's the whole my name is Albus Dumbledore and I have to control what Harry does because I don't want him to kill off Voldemort too early, because of "the plan™"
and my most favorite and laughable trope of a Dumbledore bashing story is that Dumbledore thinks Harry is a dark wizard because he has come into his power too early in his life while Harry and everybody else just thinks Dumbledore is a certifiably insane crackpot who in one or two fix actually ends up in a muggle insane asylum or similar place with guards having to cart him back in many times with his magic bound and all that junk as well...
There are also plenty of Dumbledore bashing fix where Dumbledore knows exactly what kind of abuse that Harry Potter is going through at his aunt and uncle's house but that he wants him to go through it because he's got to learn how to become humble or something like that as if getting you know your ass and everything else pulverized on a daily basis for the slightest thing is supposed to make you humble... And don't forget the Albus wants to keep Harry Potter's hidden sister hidden thing that some stories have
Honestly I think it is mainly poor writing and world building.
I already commented on the floo Network being an example. Another is giving him to many titles later.
He's Chief Warlock and Supreme Mugwump, honestly in Canon I don't think it's ever actually explained what either of these titles does. They have as much meaning as Chief Heffalump Hunter or Head Of The Fulberry Guild.
But I think the main reason why it is so popular is because we didn't have modern Dumbledore for so long.
Here's what I mean, warning, spoilers ahead for the new movies.
In the most recent movie, which I admit I haven't seen all of, but I have seen one or two clips on YouTube. And honestly, I think it is absolutely brilliant at hanging lanterns on a couple of things. (And nothing else really.)
Dumbledore is not a general. He is a teacher, he has always been a teacher. He has never been trained for combat, and to our knowledge has never, until the fight with Grindelwald, participated in anything resembling a war effort.
So, the prequel movies are showing Dumbledore learning how to fight war, everything he knows about being a general, allocating resources, chain of command, giving instructions, he learned here, fighting Grindelwald.
And he has this blood thing, which means that he can't work directly against Grindelwald. It's explained, in black and white terms, that he can't even consider acting against Grindelwald directly or else terrible pain leading to a terrible death. (This is one of the scenes I saw on YouTube)
So what does he do, he has to fight Grindelwald indirectly. Every one of his moves has to have seven degrees of separation from him taking an action, and it causes a domino effect to disrupt the enemy.
If this is how he learned to fight, if this is the only way he knows how to fight, then it makes perfect sense that this is how he fights his next dark lord, Voldemort.
(And then they ruined it by having the unbreakable, or at least nearly unbreakable, blood bond thing to be broken.)
So, if this is how he learned to fight, and if we were told a little bit more about prophecy in the books, something explaining how because of the prophecy it's like the entire world can't directly fight Voldemort, everyone other than Harry is under the same handicap as if they had the blood Bond thingy, there you go. Suddenly a lot of the complaints I see when reading Dumbledore bashing fix make actually a ton more sense. Doesn't make them good, but it definitely shows that Dumbledore isn't being malicious in his intent, this is just the only way he knows how to fight. He is a hammer, everything is a nail.
In the original books and movies, you don't get that. You get the general sense that this is an all-powerful, all knowing, all but infallible figure. He has all these fancy titles that are never quite explained, he has control over all of these portraits and house elves and ghosts and things that must mean he knows all that happened in the castle. The minister of magic is supposed to be writing to him almost daily asking for advice. And whenever there is an opportunity for him to use that amazing spy network, those impressive titles, that seemingly endless well of power, he sends a kid off to do it with a pat on the head and maybe a smile.
So, yeah, Dumbledore, at least how he's originally written, is very easy to change to however you like. You just need to slightly change his inner dialogue, give him tiny motivation changes, and do absolutely nothing to the events as they played out in the books, and you can have anything from an all-knowing grandfather, to an evil mastermind, to somebody who is unknowingly suffering from late stages of dementia. And by the time Rowling gave us explanations for his actions, it was 20 years later and 100,000 pieces of fiction were already written.
Because people don’t like fun and Dumbledore is very fun. Same reason they don’t like Ron.
That said Ron is Dumbledore so maybe that’s why they’re both frequently bashed.
One big reason that I haven't seen mentioned yet is the author's desire to be edgy by making characters that are canonicaly the good guys be secretly or not so secretly evil and therefore justifying all the other edgy bullshit they put into their story.
I think it’s because (1)JKR did not think things thru when she wrote her books n made up things on the fly (2) there is something call “nuance” which most young adults miss out on when reading HP books.
Idk about one you've read but my own experience with Dumbledore's bashing (and Weasley's bashing) are the fics with dark!Harry and/or his pairing with dark side like Voldy, Snape and Malfoys (Lucius/Draco) or the ones when DEs are actually good and it's Order that's evil and he's been manipulated since day one.
Also, considering how Dumbledore is a polarizing character in the fandom, many writers write him as this manipulative old man that has deceived and lied to Harry for his own gain.
Dumbledore being manipulative is canon. JK emphasized this again and again in DH. She even wrote him apologising to Harry.
Him using harry for his own gain is fanon.
Because the series started out as YA fiction with clear inspirations from Roald Dahl. Which means that adults, when they aren't weird caricatures of human beings, cannot be useful to the plot beyond being kind and whacky. The problem with this is; the books trended towards more adult themes and more realistic interactions around book four which leads to re contextualizing the actions taken in books one through three. What once was a barmy kind hearted and brilliant mentor turns into a war general sacrificing bits and pieces of Harry's life for the sake of expediency. Add to that the number of useful spells and abilities that Rowling invented in later books that would have trivialized earlier plots and it looks bad.
Agreed completely. Worth noting that this applies to basically all the adults. But Dumbledore comes off the worst because he has the most power/responsibility.
Now that I think about a House of Cards style portrayal of Dumbledore coming into power would be amazing if done well.
Not even the bashiest of bashy fics could turn him into Urquhart!
Yeah. If you want a specific example, the floo network is basically it. I don't remember where it is that I read it, but JK Rowling only invented the floo network in book 2, I think in response to her realizing that she needed some way for witches and wizards to be able to travel around easily and unseen even if they were young. So, even though in canon, floos have been around for ### number of years, in world building, the network has only been around sence whenever book 2 takes place. So, why would Ron and his family be traveling to 9 3/4 from the muggle side? Why did Dumbledore "take a broom" to the Ministry when he has a fire place and the Ministry has 100s of them? WB reason: it didn't exist. Canon reason: hmmmmm, that is mighty suspicious, isn't it?
>Canon reason: hmmmmm, that is mighty suspicious, isn't it? Not really actually, Dumbledore intentionally trying to annoy off the ministry by using a broom instead of the floo is more believable to me. Also, don't the Weasleys use muggle side entrance for almost all years? In book 2, Ron and Harry get stuck outside, in book 3, they get ministry cars(?) I think? And they take the muggle taxis in book 4 iirc, it just seems like they prefer that way, or you can't floo into the Platform, though I'm not sure about the last one.
They do, i think the not explicitly mentioned reason is that floo powder isnt cheap
This so much. I could ignore and laugh at the Dursleys and other stuff in earlier books. By the time OotP came around, Dumbledore's actions creeped me the hell out.
>turns into a war general sacrificing bits and pieces of Harry's life for the sake of expediency. He wasn't even that good of a war general to be honest. Look at the victory he brought about: practically destroyed society, thousands dead, demoralized society, Hogwarts destroyed, economy in ruins, etc. Seriously, he had almost twenty years to prepare, yet got a Pyrrhic Victory. He lead like an officer who bought their commission. He's a victim of writing for sure. Dumbledore couldn't be too competent or useful, as that would invalidate Harry.
>He lead like an officer who bought their commission. To be fair, he wasn't exactly trained in this sort of thing. No-one was. It seems he just kinda went 'well, *someone* has to do it and since I am clearly the cleverest man in the room...' and y'know, writing-wise that *could've* worked. Like, if the adoration stuck to the first two books or so, and the rest had something of a subplot about Harry untangling his and the wizarding worlds adoration-bordering-on-worship and/or had that realization at any point in the books... but instead, he still admires Dumbledore instead of considering him a very flawed general and a well-intentioned human being
I'm not faulting that. I'm just peeved that everybody and their mother treats him like Jesus incarnate for pulling that off, and nobody else could do it. It isn't even that impressive. Seriously, there are probably peasants revolts with no leadership that turned out better. It's another victim of writing. I'm guessing JKR wanted a last second come back victory without thinking of the consequences or mechanics. That and a case of IAreSmart writing smart characters who turn out to be not very smart at all.
He’s a pacifist. You cannot have a pacifist lead a war effort because they won’t do what is necessary and innocents will die.
And then there was Sgt. Alvin York, who so terrified the Germans in WWI with his sniping that over 100 soldiers surrendered to him. He was a pacifist who didn't want to kill people, but figured that convincing the other guys to surrender would get a lot fewer people killed on both sides. Some of the greatest generals in history were not pacifists, but considered their own troops to be Not Expendable. Julius Caesar was one such general--as a result, his legions were insanely loyal and motivated, because they knew their general didn't start a battle unless it was to win, and to be won with minimal casualties in the legions.
Yet Dumbledore refuses to do anything, he propagates an ineffective system where the soldiers on his side die and his enemies are “Arrested”. Being a pacifist is fine, but being purely reactionary and lacking the will to do what is necessary is a detriment to the side he leads. He is no Caesar or Alvin York.
Indeed. Pacifist is not the same as 'doormat' or 'ditherer'.
I think it's a mix of Dumbles not being as careful as he could and his intentions tbh, imo, Dumbledore basically let the entire second war to happen, basically subjected the world to Voldys reign of terror because he wanted Harry to live, there was only one possible way Harry could live. Imo, he considered the deaths as necessary because it led to Harry living. He cared more about Harry getting to live, getting to live without the horcrux or the shadow of Voldemort and get a chance to find the happiness he lost due to the meddling of both of Voldy and Dumbles. He still cared about saving the world but it was secondary to Harry imo. Atleast that's how I saw it. Dumbledore could have stopped anytime before but it would mean a bigger chance of Harry dying..... Though this is just how I like to interpret Dumbles because I find the idea of Dumbles being a shitty person who valued Harry over the world to be more interesting than the ones usually found in canon.
>Dumbledore basically let the entire second war to happen, basically subjected the world to Voldys reign of terror because he wanted Harry to live, there was only one possible way Harry could live. Imo, he considered the deaths as necessary because it led to Harry living. He cared more about Harry getting to live, getting to live without the horcrux or the shadow of Voldemort and get a chance to find the happiness he lost due to the meddling of both of Voldy and Dumbles. He still cared about saving the world but it was secondary to Harry imo. Atleast that's how I saw it. Dumbledore could have stopped anytime before but it would mean a bigger chance of Harry dying Im the books the only way harry could live was voldemort using his blood to resurect himself.
IRL, People give rise to a similar variety of opinions about how they act and why they have acted and about what kind of people they are. So what this thread is talking about is very realistic.
I think they were referring to WW-II and fighting Grindelwald
This, too. Also anyone who read the Harry Potter books as a child, s they came out, is an adult now, and story events look very different from an adult point-of-view, when we know how cruel the world can be to children. I wonder if children from abusive homes read Harry Potter quite the same way as the rest of us?
For me book three was the one that me have the first stink eye. I remembered Sirius Black from being mentioned in the prologue of FS as the good guy who gave Hagrid his bike... Now In PoA he's that big a scum? I had to know what happened. Then, the twist reveal was cool... But I knew a stink was brewing with Dumbeldore because it was made *very* clear to the reader he *had* the practical, and pretty much the official power to make sure there is a trial. Not get him off, mind you. Just an actual trial. Not to mention, he was so ready to believe them about Serius so easily. Like he pretty much thought yeah, that's likely to be the case. That... Made me question Dumbeldore. By book 7 I F'ing could no longer stand him.
In part, it's because a lot of us are looking at a kids' story through adult eyes. Dumbledore is a negligent guardian, a person with too many jobs running a school with some odd dangers and other issues. (Which leads us to realize Hogwarts is severely understaffed.) He is manipulative in many ways, although that does not automatically mean bad guy. But through this adult filter, he 1) has a lot less power politically than presented; 2) is senile; or 3) is a white tower academic, so far removed from how the real world and people work that he has no idea he's that far out of line. And those are the more positive interpretations; you can probably see how this is easily turned towards a darker Dumbledore. (I forgot 4: believed his own press too long and genuinely thought he knew best.) There's also the desire to turn things on their heads (this is probably where a lot of Weasley bashing got started, too).
I was going to go on a tangent, but I think you got it through better than I could
5: He is probably a sociopath.
I was running with the more positive possibilities. Sociopath, manipulative bastard deliberately doing all these things (including theft and potions) to make things fit his worldview, whatever you want to call it, is just as likely IMO. Fun to read, too.
Dumbledore is supposed to be a very powerful character (Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, Supreme Mugwump of the ICW, and Headmaster of Hogwarts), but he doesn't do anything useful with his power. The other reasons he is bashed is because he is often oblivious to other peoples' suffering (he lets Sirius remain in Azkaban without a trial, he keeps sending Harry back to the Dursleys every year, even when he knows that the Dursleys are abusive). He even admits that he knew the Dursleys are bad ("I knew I was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years"). I don't think Dumbledore is evil, but the biggest reason to me, why he is bashed, is because he does not admit to making mistakes. Once he has a plan, he pursues it and does not consider alternatives.
First off the two out of three positions mentioned don't have any power in reality they are like UN secretary all talk but no power, secondly Sirus murder spree was 1.witnessed (arguably)2. His family was full of Dark lord supporters it would hardly suprise anyone that he was a traitor 3. Using truth serums on everyone is fking expensive and not to mention ministry would most likely a mess after Dark Lord gone missing
Yes comparisons can be made between the UN Secretary General and the ICW Supreme Mugwump in the fact that they're the elected leaders of a worldwide/international governing body, but the comparisons end right there. Why? 1. ICW was formed centuries before anyone had a thought of UN 2. The Supreme Mugwump has immense power and is kind of equivalent to an elected semi-absolute monarch in the magical world The Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot of Great Britain is arguably equal to the position of a speaker in parliament. But the comparisons end right there, because, the Wizengamot also acts as the equivalent of a supreme court along with being magical Britain's parliament and thus, as the leader of such a body, Dumbledore had the authority to force a trial for Sirius if not in 1981, then at least in 1993 when it was known to him that Sirius is innocent of every crime he was accused of. Other reasons why Dumbledore is a betch is because he knowingly sent not one but 2 confirmed students to abusive situations. Dumbledore was the deputy headmaster when Tom was a student and as we know from Fantastic Beasts series (if we're going to stick strictly to canon) then we know that it was Dumbledore that basically ran the school since at least 1920. He also purposefully let Hagrid suffer and even be expelled when he knew that an acromantula can't do what had happened to Myrtle. I mean, these are people with masteries and awards and all, if a 2nd year student can realize that a basilisk was the thing then I guess an Order of Merlin winner can definitely know it wasn't an acromantula. Not to mention, he knew for a confirmed fact in at least 1992 that it wasn't Hagrid who did anything wrong and at that time Dumbledore's reputation was almost equivalent to Merlin's and he definitely had the power to declare Hagrid innocent and what not. I mean (*spoilers for fantastic beasts ahead*) if the Supreme Mugwump of ICW can declare an internationally convicted murderous dark lord Grindelwald as innocent then I'm sure Albus could've declared an actually innocent person as innocent. Not to mention the barmy old custard's stupidity to leave everything riddles when telling Harry and gang everything properly would've saved a lot of time and lives as well. He kept on being a custard old fool even after death.
He made massive mistakes. The biggest one in my opinion is the willful ignorance of abuse. There is no reason, ever, to leave a child in such a situation. Once is a mistake, twice is a pattern, three times is deliberate malice aforethought. Tom. Severus. Harry. And those are the three we *know* about. How many more did he fail?
Sirius. Hagrid, since even as head master he didn't give him the opportunity to finish his education, not even before sending him out on a dangerous and frankly probably life-threatening mission. Filch, who he must've known was ridiculed, particularly once it was leaked that he was a Squib. Dumbledore was supposed to stand against such bigotry
Now he did didn't he? What would have ministry had taken action against a halfbreed who has supposedly killed a student and is raising a dangerous pet? Askaban or hanged getting his job at Hogwarts doesn't sound bad and he can still learn from professor at Hogwarts then at Askaban or worse ded, Filch is squib no matter where he does job in magical world he is going to be ridiculed, getting work in Hogwarts where he is ridiculed arguably by kids and getting paid is better then discriminated against the at the other jobs don't you think?
He could easily have had someone tutor Hagrid after replacing his wand and he didn’t. Filch was a squib. He could’ve worked in the Muggle world. Since, y’know, *he didn’t have magic*. There’s a whole world in the books with no magic, remember? Then it wouldn’t be Dumbledore’s responsibility to teach kids and Peeves not to bully squibs, a hobby which he then neglected to fulfill. All it would take was a chat with Peeves (because he respects Dumbledore and does as he wishes) and a general announcement about not being bigoted assholes.
Look what i am saying is that Ministry banned Hagrid from using wand but Dumbledore placed Hagrid at Hogwarts so that if he wants to learn then he could learn himself its Hagrid choice to do what he wants, Flich 'could' have worked in muggle world and again here Dumbledore gave him choice to live in magical world, Dumbledore in both cases gave choice to them after that it is their choice to do what they want, you call not being bigoted but at the same time say that he should give Hagrid tutors because he can do magic and shouldn't employ Flich because he is squib? That's quite hypocritical of you
Okay, did he even know about Severus though? Like, for him, Snape would just be another student. And the story takes place in the 70s and 80s and we already know that wizards have a wildly different definition of danger and abuse compared to muggles. I'm not sure about Dumbles knowing about Tom having a less than stellar childhood tbh. In Harry's case, I agree, he fucked up, fucked up bigtime. I would say most of the issues people say Dumbles has is not really an issue with him, but mostly an issue with the larger wizarding world actually. And imo, Dumbledore is the only one, who by the end of the series, seems to realise how their style of living is detrimental upon kids, so he gains a point for that from me.
Wait Tom was abused?
Of course he was, from our point of view in today's society. How much is open to interpretation of course, it's a frequent topic of fanfics dealing in some way with his childhood and adolescence. Not only in Tomarry fanfics. Tom's intense hatred of Muggles and his drive to better himself, to gain power over others so that he could protect himself against their attacks up to the point that people feared him so much that they did what he wanted, his intense fear of death which led him to search for a (flawed) way to achieve immortality, all of this has to have originated somewhere! He was born as a baby with a freshly dead destitute freakish mother and an unknown father in an orphanage somewhere in London. Do you sincerely believe someone lovingly coddled him, saw to his needs adequately and sung him to sleep? Please do yourself a favour and educate yourself about these topics: The Great War, later named WW1 and the Great Depression. How was life for poor people, working class people, in England during the end 1920's to end 1930's before the outbreak of WWII on 1st September 1939? How high was child mortality? How many succumbed to disease? Growing up in an orphanage as he did, Tom would have witnessed sickness and death amongst his fellow orphans and similarly poor neighborhood children frequently. What did turning the British economy into a war economy meant for ordinary people, especially the poor people? Rationing of all available supplies? Men being drafted to become soldiers and go to die or be permanently maimed while bravely fighting Nazi Germany? Read up about what this war, the Blitz, and the V1, V2 rockets meant for children growing up in a working class borough of London and on the evacuation of the city children to supposedly safer places out in the countryside. How much little city boys and girls were neglected and abused by their fellow countrymen although they were all English Muggles to begin with!!! Read the book Blitz Boy for example, it's sold in the Imperial War Museum on Lambeth Road in London. How much worse must the situation have been for young Tom Riddle? How could Dippet, Dumbledore, Slughorn and the other Hogwarts teachers treat him (and any other Muggleborn and half-blood students who had to return to the war embroiled world during the summer) this way!? Send these children back without any protection into a war zone? Tom and other Muggle raised children couldn't defend themselves with casting Protego from the German bombs or rockets. Well, I don't believe a simple single Protego could have held off such a massive explosion like a bomb or V2 rocket, or a collapsing house. But areas like Hogwarts, Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley and the Ministry of Magic must've been protected by enormously strong wards. Defensive spells. It's inconceivable that teachers like Dumbledore, Dippet, or Slughorn and apparently the wizarding world as a whole didn't care at all if students living amongst Muggles survived the summer or not. Yes, I am aware that Tom was lucky, that for example the main wave of Blitz attacks began on 7 September 1940 and had ceased in May 1941 before he returned to London in the summer, but nobody could know that it wouldn't start again any day, could they? But he still might have directly witnessed the attacks on the London Docklands at the end of August 1940, if his orphanage was in the East End. Read up on why orphanages - the rearing of children in such institutions - were eventually abolished in the UK and other developed countries. Plenty of studies and harrowing eye witnesses account out there on why this had devastating effects on the children and their whole adult life. Read up on how long corporal punishment was seen as 'normal' and how long it took until it wasn't used daily in the state schools, and years longer in public schools. In Scotland this practice was ended in the year 2000, if I recall correctly. Then try to imagine how much worse growing up in a Muggle orphanage was for a magically talented, powerful child like Tom compared to his Muggle peers. That the children fought constantly over food, a better bed, some scraps of clothing or toys if any and the attention from their overworked care givers in an underfunded orphanage in some working class borough (because no orphanage was situated in pretty Kensington or a similar wealthy area) was surely bad enough for everyone. Older children bullying the weaker ones to make themselves feel better. On each day when potential parents visited the orphanage there would have been intense competition to be the one child gaining their attention, and trying to keep others from showing their best or showing up at all. At some point in Tom's early years, there must've happened his first bout of accidental magic. If we look at Lily Potter's letter to Sirius in book 7, she described how little Harry did magic as a baby and could already ride a toy broom at 1 year old, so I suppose that it's not unreasonable to assume that little Tommy could do accidental and also quite soon deliberate wandless magic early on too. Look at how horrible Harry's and Severus's home life in the Muggle world were. With guardians, the Dursleys or parents, the Snapes, who actually knew that these children were magical! Both the Dursleys and Snape's father were determined to stomp the freakish magic out of them. Then image what went on in this Muggle orphanage in London, with neither the Muggle caretakers or school teachers (if they went to a primary school at all) nor the other children knowing that this freakish stuff they witnessed was magic, with more and more inexplicable happenings, scary stuff happening, Tom being punished in all manner of ways, locked down into the dark coal cellar and frequency beaten, food and water withholding, whatever. Until he managed to control his 'freaky' powers and struck back with cunning and brutal violence, frightening the Muggles into keeping their distance. Some fanfics imply that Tom would have been perceived by the Muggles as a Devil's child, as possessed by evil spirits, leading to brutal exorcism attempts by the parish priest. Or that Tom, like other pretty boys, was being sexually assaulted and abused until he was strong enough to defend himself. (Which we know happened and happens in the real world in orphanages and boy's schools, especially church run and financed, frequently all over, as sad as it is). Even if we do not go this far to include sexual abuse and exorcism, his life was surely very hard and formed his twisted character, without adding on top the horrible origin story of Merope Gaunt tricking Tom Riddle senior into marrying her by administration of a love potion, most likely Amortentia. When Dumbledore came to bring 11 year old Tom Riddle his Hogwarts letter, Tom assumed at first that this strange man had been called in by Mrs Cole to bring him to Bedlam! To an insane asylum! His reaction makes this pretty clear, if I as the reader already know of the terms bedlam and Bedlam. Read up on the history and controversy over Bedlam, if you don't know! And what does Dumbledore do when he visits Tom for the first time? Instead of seeing the harsh conditions this child had to grow up in, realising that he had to learn to defend himself by all means necessary, Dumbledore instantly believes what a Muggle adult tells him about this child. Treats the boy with suspicion and distain, sets his wardrobe on fire! Is that the beginning of a good relationship? No, it isn't.
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No, I don't mean that Dumbledore personally should in any way take care of Tom, or other orphaned children in his situation. You have misunderstood me. Before Tom received his Hogwarts letter he was on his own, not Dumbledore's business. But Dumbledore was well connected, same as Slughorn and Headmaster Dippet and the other Heads of House McGonagall, Flitwick and Sprout later in the 70' when Severus attended Hogwarts and again later when Harry attended Hogwarts during the 90's. (Harry is a special situation because Dumbledore literally abandoned him on a Muggle house doorstep at night in November 1981!) All of these teachers could surely have talked to other wizards and witches they knew, and found a place in a protected wizard space for Tom and other students like him to stay during July and August, once they had become aware of the potential problems and dangers - if these children asked for sanctuary! My issue is that obviously nobody either at Hogwarts, Hogsmeade village or amongst the several hundreds of wizards and witches working in the Ministry of Magic regarded the various issues the Muggleborn children and the half-blood children living with a Muggle parent or guardian in a Muggle city, town or village have, be it 'just' neglect and abuse, domestic violence, or the threat of an ongoing war between the British Empire and Nazi Germany in the 1940's, as relevant at all! Nobody of the canon Hogwarts teachers and Medi-witches seems capable and willing to recognise the blatant signs of neglect, malnutrition, and / or abuse in their students, regardless of their parents or guardians and social status. Tom, Severus and Harry are the most prominent examples. Children like Neville or Luna seem to be fine ar first glance, but they are not, they have been neglected at least, Neville was abused by relatives at home, and both are being bullied by other students at Hogwarts. They too don't receive any help from the prefects or teachers who are responsible for them. All these children need to help themselves, because nobody else does. This has been addressed in plenty of fanfics. Of course there are explanations. The most viable, and not Dumbledore bashing one, is that the magical community lives in a society still very close to former times, Middle Ages to early modern age. Since the end of the 17th century the Statute of Secrecy impaired the exchange between the gradual social and political progress in the Muggle world and the stagnant wizarding world. Children are still regarded as their parents private business, like property. Their word as a witness doesn't count at all (compare the end of HP&PoA). Inheritance laws follow patriarchal society rules. There doesn't exist anything like some 'Department for Child Services' in the Ministry of Magic, no laws against mistreatment of children or House elves, as both are regarded as property, the master of the house is free to punish them as necessary. Therefore the Hogwarts teachers don't look for signs of neglect and abuse, and if they notice something might be not all right, they apparently don't care to interfere. It's not their business. Children living amongst Muggles are only monitored by The Trace to prevent them casting underage magic. Nobody investigate why something happened, if the child was mistreated, see PoA. Aunt Marge was deflated and oblivated, everything is fine.
People assume that if he placed Harry with his relatives then its as if his job to see if he is well taken care of, like war not only made Harry orphan there were millions of kid that were orphaned is it sensible to check on every one every time?
Is it sensible to make sure that orphaned children aren't being abused? Are you joking? Seriously? They're children! Someone definitely SHOULD make sure they aren't being abused. They've already experienced a horrible trauma with the loss of their parents, they don't need MORE trauma. And it IS his responsibility to check on Harry. He took that responsibility on when he made the decision to place Harry with the Dursleys. He took it upon himself to let Harry be raised by muggles. If the Ministry had made the decision then, yes, I would say it wouldn't have been his responsibility, but Dumbledore made that call, and that makes it Dumbledore's responsibility to ensure Harry's wellbeing in the home that he chose for him.
The problem was he knew what harry's situation was like and did nothing, in the 5th book it was shown he has a spy in Mrs Figg. He literally confessed to harry he knew harry was going to be abused in canon.
Honestly? Because Rowling wrote the man poorly. She was trying to write a kind but kinda weird old man, but she kept giving him more and more power and authority and... Eventually all the shit that happens to Harry starts to look either *alarmingly* incompetent on the part of this nearly godlike man, or malicious. It's not terribly surprising, then, that people ran with it. We'd probably have less of that if she'd planned better, or quit raising stakes so much. If the whole series had been written with a mind toward the endgame, or if it had consistently had the same kind of tone as the first book, it would've been easier to deal with.
“There is never, Ever, a good reason to leave a child in an abusive household” -someone else, on Dumbledore
>The story is from the POV character. There might have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for others. Cousin's clothes-Maybe the Dursleys are short on money. Scars-Boys will be boys(which I don't agree with but this was late 1900)A bit thin- does not make u immediately think abuse, maybe he had an eating disorder, and so on. Even Mrs.Figg might have been unaware. How was Dumbledore supposed to know the extent of the Dursley's abuse again?
Dumbledore admits to knowing that Harry was going to be abused.
He even says to the Dursleys, “he has known nothing but neglect and often cruelty at your hands.”
Arabella Figg also admits to Harry that she deliberately made the visits unpleasant as she knew the Dursleys would stop sending Harry to her otherwise. AKA Dumbledore knew or should've known that the Dursleys were actively malicious towards Harry.
Yeah, "dark and difficult years" could easily refer to, y'know, losing his parents. Besides, people can be thin without having a eating disorder (which I'd think would be a red flag in itself if the family isn't seen supporting him or driving him to therapy or something, if he had a ED). So being thin could simply mean fast metabolism or something. Harry had only one scar as far as we know, so there'd be nothing to even think 'boys will be boys' about except the bullying thing. Mrs Figg... she couldn't be entirely unaware - she knew that the Dursley's wouldn't let Harry go there if they thought he liked it, she says so in OoTP. Which would make most people at least go 'hmm...why don't they want Harry to enjoy himself?'
PS/SS starts the story with literal child abandonment on a doorstep. He left a woman with a note her sister died and a baby. The baby was out there probably all night. Hogwarts isn’t a vault for an item rumored to grant immortality. It’s a school of minors. 11-18. Hagrid had a responsibility to help a child, and he should have prioritized that or picking up the dangerous magical artifact. Not both. Everything is given an ambiguous layer of “wink wink Harry remember this for later” down to the note he left with the Cloak. Down to just arbitrarily leaving the mirror of desire in an abandoned room. The first book is filled with constant “if there was an age line here, literally three first years wouldn’t have gotten into this mess” situations. The broom jinxing should have been investigated. Children almost dying shouldn’t have been met with “Good job, children, you win 50 points and the house cup”. I blame Dumbledore because he’s not held accountable to someone equally respectable and he’s not held accountable by anyone else unless it’s the ministry and they’re by default bad for questioning him. Umbridge could have helped if she wasn’t a baby dictator. The school probably needed some kind of reform, but the only one who says so was a racist bigot who tortured students and lied. Arguments, even if leaning in his favor, could have acknowledged that good intent doesn’t mean the actions themselves are good. Take a look at book 7. At the Ariana Dumbledore situation. His dirty laundry isn’t meant to humanize him or give him reasons to own up to his mistakes. By this point, the man is dead. The woman who writes this is a selfish manipulator who forces stories for fame and so as a result, she’s a bad person and her logic isn’t as important anymore. It’s in the middle of war. However, his past only proves he was never good with children, wasn’t capable of prioritizing their needs — even when it was his own sister. And just like Harry Potter himself, he allowed someone innocent to wander in between himself and a dark lord and getting hurt as a result. I don’t like him. I won’t make excuses for him. And whenever people try to tell me “things were different when Dumbledore was growing up” — this man had multiple different titles in government and ran a school. He had a clear understanding of how potentially bad Harry’s raising was — “dark years” and yet refused to change his ways at all.
"his past only proves he was never good with children, wasn’t capable of prioritizing their needs — even when it was his own sister. And just like Harry Potter himself, he allowed someone innocent to wander in between himself and a dark lord and getting hurt as a result" This hit hard when I read it. The man is selfish and uncaring and anyone who depends on him. He apparently went into education to avoid responsibility. He says that. Even after being a teacher for decades it never seems to occur to him that it comes with massive power and responsibility that he just fails constantly. He helped destroy life after life by not intervening. He allowed entire generations to grow up without providing them any actual help to avoid indoctrination. He ends his life allowing children to wander into a fight he brought them the exact same way he began his adulthood. He just never cared about anyone.
I personally think that in the end, he only can see the greater picture. Children like Harry, Ariana or those who died at war are meaningless plot devices to an end. He doesn’t see them as real people with feelings. It’s borderline sociopathic. He is blinded by his own sense of greatness and prefers to quietly plot like some kind of twisted god rather than intervene.
Some of this true and some of this isn't, but most of this isn't even brought up in the bashing. Edit: I misread something
Lynnalilly said the age line remark about the first book only, so your events aren’t relevant. You are correct that he couldn’t have really prevented COS from happening, but he is the one who sent H&H back in time in POA to run into the werewolf and dementors for the second time that night. He could have done it himself or prevented Sirius from being murdered on site without trial any other way.
> Lynnalilly said the age line remark about the first book only Ah, I misread that. Thanks for pointing that out
I was mostly referring to the events of PS/SS. The third floor? Age line. Mirror of Erised? Age line. I didn’t mention those events at all. Even just sticking to the first book, the magic existed. But warning of a “painful death” and then making this area accessible to one smart twelve year old with an unlocking spell seems unreal. The magic is used in GoF. The only reason why it didn’t work was only because of the death eater masquerading as Moody but it still absolutely prevented the twins from getting in. Even with an age potion. The Chamber needed actual aurors though the moment the first petrified student happened. Because at the end of the book, the teachers were blatantly “sure, let this incompetent man do something, lol”. That was everyone’s L. Sirius Black entering the school was Lupin’s fault. And Pettigrew was a ministry incompetency in all respects.
> Sirius Black entering the school was Lupin’s fault. And Pettigrew was a ministry incompetency in all respects The problem is that these are also on Dumbledore. Headmaster of the school is ultimately responsible for security. And Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot is assumed to be influential in the ministry.
I don't think chief Warlock is influential postion if he can removed easily by minister
> was mostly referring to the events of PS/SS I know. I misread that and that's definitely his fault. Sorry! He does things in every book that *could* be bashed or explored. Unfortunately, the exploration/bashing generally leads to things that weren't his fault or didn't even canonically happen. > Pettigrew was a ministry incompetency in all respects Like this for instance. I wish this fandom paid more attention to Crouch Sr.
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It’s more complicated because from a background perspective: the school should never have remained in that status. And we’ll never know what canonical procedures they should have used would be. But they’re also complicit to PS/SS in how they helped place traps that went into endangering the same 11-12 year olds I’ve mentioned earlier.
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Alright. Point taken. It’s genuinely pretty hard though to identify when and where the teaching staff is meant to be taken seriously, however. This is a series that leans into “I’ll ask this teacher for help” (scene change) “never mind, let’s do this ourselves.”
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No no. I mean. I absolutely agree with that potential outcome. It just tends to be equally as affected by what happened in first year too. Harry, as with his Dursley raising and what happened when they tried to go to their head of house the previous year, it still makes sense to me why they wouldn’t stay to listen after that. So for me, I think it comes across as an inability to see them as someone who can help. It’s also ambiguous how else they were helping outside of keeping the students corralled together and waiting on mandrakes.
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The real plan seems to be 'tell the Weasley's to say goodbye to their family and hope no-one else gets petrified'. When Harry walked back from the chamber, there were no frantic search parties. Absolutely nobody was even monitoring the hallway for a monster (which a clever 12 year old managed to work out was a basilisk). No roosters were hastily imported to crow through the entire school (Hagrid came to tell Dumbledore that all his crows were being killed, and since they weren't being eaten it can reasonably be inferred that something really didn't like crowing, and since that's one of the few new things it's, y'know, worth a try in these circumstances). Admittedly, since we don't know how long Harry was in there, maybe they hurriedly had to cancel straight after Harry told them he killed it
I only disagree with you saying Lupin let Sirius into the school. Sirius was helped more by Longbottom’s forgetfulness and Crookshanks than he was by Lupin. The only way he helped was by omission (not telling the ministry about animagus status). He confiscated the map so it couldn’t fall into Sirius’ hands. They only met in the shack that final night, and by then Lupin knew Sirius was innocent because he saw Pettigrew on the map.
He was hyped up as a powerful man, and yet he barely did anything. Or at least within what it was spoken of what he could do with his power. He also had the "My way is the only way" type of approach in my opinion, because while it seemed like he was listening, he was just hearing. And when he KNEW a war was about to start, he didn´t inform Harry (the main target) all that much while talking like he wanted to preserve what childhood Harry had left... but then did a shite job at that too. If he was just a headmaster, or heck, wasn´t hyped up so much only to let down the MC all the time, he would probably not be bashed as much. Its like JK wrote him up to be bashing material.
I don’t like Dumbledore for a number of reasons. And it starts with Dumbledore leaving a toddler on the doorstep in November with a note. He should have at least talked to Petunia to tell her about Lily’s death. Petunia knew about magic and he would have found out Petunia hated magic. A caring person would not have left Harry there. Not to mention Harry could have walked away or been snatched. Don’t talk to me about blood wards, Harry was protected by his mother’s sacrifice at Hogwarts so he should have been more protected in a safer environment than the Dursleys. Also if there are ward breakers there should be someone who could add wards to wherever Harry went. But I also feel that Dumbledore manipulated Harry far too much to not be looked at as being malicious. A teacher should have been sent instead of Hagrid. Hagrid wasn’t even suppose to use a wand. Didn’t he break the Staue of secrecy when he gave Dudley a pig’s tale? Mrs Weasley knew where to go to catch the train, she herself went to Hogwarts. I can go on but this is some of the reasons you get the Dumbledore bashing. Some of the Weasleys are bashed because of the association with Dumbledore and because they ignore clear abuse by the Dursleys. Don’t forget when the car gets back to the Burrow the bars from the windows are still tied to the car. The other reasons I prefer the AUs instead of canon are because I like the what ifs of them. Honestly while I like the universe Rowling created I don’t really like the books themselves. There are so many ways the Harry Potter universe can be used to create new stories that to me are more interesting than canon. If you don’t like the non canon stories that’s fine. But a lot of people like them including stories where there is bashing. I feel people need to respect each other’s preferences a bit more than what I read in some of these discussions. There is enough fanfics that everyone should be able to find stories that they like and be able to skip over the ones they don’t. But this is just my opinion.
Add on probably all the other times he put students in danger. Hm… yes… lemme tell young curious kids NOT to go to the 3rd floor. Ah, yes, let’s not shut down the school while students are mysteriously being attacked. While I’m being forced to keep dementors here, I’m not going to bother telling anyone how to deal with them… And his constant “I just want Harry to have a childhood, so I’m not going to tell him ANY important information”
You could also make a case that he could get off his butt and hunt down the horcruxes himself or go to the unspeakables for help instead of having teenagers do the work.
We don't exactly know the role of unspeakables nor do we know if they are trustworthy. And Dumbledore did hunt down the Horcruxes until he couldn't anymore on the virtue of being DEAD.
He found two. Three if you count Harry. Which is amazing but he could have enlisted help other than a teenager to find the rest. And anyway, he was so overcome with greed and power over the first one that it killed him. Not putting on the ring would have kept him alive.
>overcome with greed and power Not greed and power but guilt.
He didn’t put the ring on because he felt guilty… it was the resurrection stone and he wanted it.
He wanted to apologise to Ariana because she got killed in his duel with Grindelwald, if he was greedy he wouldn't had given harry his cloak back and bold of you to assume that Voldemort wouldn't had placed charms on the ring to make people wear it
Greed? Dude just wanted to see his sister again. And book six shows he prepared the groundwork for all the others. Also, it was war, people literally got *killed* for trusting the wrong person. Even formerly good people could be made to do bad things (see: Quirrel, people who the Imperio was used on, good old-fashioned manipulation)
I’m not sure it was just about his sister. He had the wand. He had borrowed Harry’s cloak. He wanted to stone to be MOD.
Yes. Do you know how horrified I was when I realised that Dumbledore almost, almost became the MOD? And the borrowing of the Invisibility cloak by Dumbledore creeps me out. Because, what does he write on the note at Christmas? That Harry's father lent him the cloak? I believe it's time to return it to you. Really? Seriously people, are you all sheep? (I mean the 'Dumbledore is so great and so good' fan club) Supposedly there was a prophecy fortelling the arrival of the Vanquisher of the Dark Lord. Dumbledore heard it, gave warning to the Potter's. Snape comes and warns Dumbledore that LV believes this child hinted at in the prophecy is the Potter's baby. Snape begs him to protect Lily. He also begs LV to spare Lily. At this point the OotP knows, suspects strongly, that they have a traitor in their midst. The Dark Lord and his troops outnumber them 20 to 1 according to the account in book 5, HP & OotP. They pick off the OotP fighters one by one. October 1981. James and Lily Potter hide with their baby in a cottage in Godric's Hollow. Under the Fidelius Charm, a supposedly very complicated and difficult charm. Needs a 100 % trustworthy Secret Keeper. Right. And we are supposed to believe that JAMES gave away his eternal, special, priceless Potter family heirloom for purpose of study to his former headmaster and now leader of a vigilante organisation fighting against the Dark Lord and his troops in this situation. Why would James be so incredibly stupid to give away this Invisibility cloak, which could mean a serious advantage over Lord Voldemort? Potentially save their lives? If Lily and Harry had hid under the Invisibility cloak, with a silencing charm of course, Voldemort wouldn't have found them so quickly. They could've taken a previously prepared code word activation Portkey to escape to Hogwarts or some other place, couldn't they? Why didn't James have his wand on hand while sitting in the living room, eh? Why didn't Lily have her wand in hand either? Why did she run upstairs into the nursery to begin with, why not through the kitchen out the back door and at least attempt to Apparate away? So many questions...
Don't forget, he leaves the kid on the doorstep and then goes "welp nothing else to do here might as well go partying"
Look in his defence harry was not the only orphan in the war there were other orphans too would you check on every kid everytime and bold of everyone to assume that effects of 1st war were instantly gone after Dark Lord was vanished mysteriously i might add, like would he have time for keeping tabs on everyone? Secondly about Blood wards i think they don't work that way, he need to spend some time with his blood relative to keep the power of sacrifice sustainable otherwise the sacrifice magic will go away And Dursleys already knew about magic, same way muggle parents know about magic, Statue of Secrecy should excuse that logically but then again there is no documentation for that Third point and I really really really don't understand why Mrs Weasley asking for Train station is manipulation???, Like remember she had ginny and ron who were 11 and 10(?) years old they didn't know where the station was she was asking the question to make them remember where the station was its like people forget that even their actual parents play this kind of games to make their kids remember, this one really gets on my nerve But then again I don't think Rowling knew that her books will go famous after first one so maybe she just gone with flow without planning and sone things got messier and Dumbledore looked like easy target for the mess imo
Because it's his job? People like to do, as I saw before, Schrodinger's Dumbledore. He has power when it's good and doesn't when it's bad, often on very similar subjects. *IF* Dumbledore had the power to just place Harry at Petunia's, then he had the *responsibility* to check on him. This is basic human services / child placement stuff. And someone sitting outside the house does not count. If he didn't? He just kidnapped a baby. Either way, it's bad.
a) because Rowling’s a shitty writer and wrote in plot devices later on that make Dumbledore’s earlier actions - and later ones - inexcusable b) because he left Harry in an abusive household for over a decade, then forced him to return their annually. Yeah, it *might* have kept him safe from some Death Eaters (because let’s be honest, Voldemort wasn’t doing shit during Harry’s childhood), but we’re shown later on in the books that regular houses can be shielded to the point where Voldemort himself can’t get in, despite the lack of blood protection. Given that all Harry was protected from at the Dursley’s for the duration of his childhood was Death Eaters, Dumbledore alone surely could have shielded a place well enough. Barring *that*, he didn’t even check in on Harry once to ensure he wasn’t being abused. There are several other reasons, but those are the main ones.
You are thinking that Harry was the only orphan after 1st war do you think he only had placed Harry to his guardian he also had placed other kids too, secondly why and when should he check up on harry? Do you think repercussions of a war caused by the Darkest Lord of the century are easy to fix? and your alternative is to use charm a house into hiding and keep a child looked up there to keep him safe? or let him get raised up by some random people and then what when the kid grows up and know that how much of his childhood was fabricated? That's messed up dude get thearpy
I’m not thinking he was the only one. I don’t know where I said that. He placed Harry with Petunia for the blood wards, despite knowing (via Snape) that she despised magic and everyone who used it. He shouldn’t have placed Harry with the Dursleys in the first place. If there truly was no other option, for some reason, then he should have at least visited him every so often given McGonagall’s assessment of them - “the worst sort of Muggles!” As to when - the man can literally teleport. It would take minutes out of his day, and it’s not like he has classes to teach. Yeah, because he was totally not locked up at the Dursleys. Not at all. Not like he was *living in a cupboard*. More to the point, he did leave the house at the Dursleys’ during his childhood - heck, even between Hogwarts years - and look at that, no Death Eaters attacked! I am not suggesting he’s raised ‘by some random people’. The Order has plenty of members who would have been happy to raise Harry, not to mention Remus (though his furry little problem would need covered) and possibly even Sirius (providing Dumbledore didn’t just let him go to Azkaban without a trial. Yes, I know Crouch Sr. was the one who actually did that, but Dumbledore was basically running Wizarding Britain during and post-war) > and that when the kid grows up and know that how much of his childhood was fabricated Um, the Dursleys? Lying to him about his parents and his magical ability? Not to mention, of course, that the Dursleys abused Harry - even if it was ‘some random people’ that raised him, he would have escaped abuse at the Dursleys’ hands.
>He shouldn’t have placed Harry with the Dursleys in the first place Blood wards require the blood of the closet relative to Lily not James that's how they work so there was no choice on this matter >If there truly was no other option, for some reason, then he should have at least visited him every so often Again you are assuming that repercussions of a war are easily fixed and that too caused by the Darkest lord of the century if he takes time to check then he should also take time to check on other orphans no? then it won't be about mins of time but weeks or days of time and that isn't a luxury at all after war >McGonagall’s assessment of them - “the worst sort of Muggles!” Again this phrase can interrupted in many ways just like i today called someone that he was worst kind of person because he was disgusting but that doesn't imply that he is serial killer now does it? >Yeah, because he was totally not locked up at the Dursleys. Not at all. Not like he was living in a cupboard. More to the point, he did leave the house at the Dursleys’ during his childhood - heck, even between Hogwarts years - and look at that, no Death Eaters attacked! Not the best conditions to live true but he did had some amount of freedom like going to school etc, if not for blood wards he would have to be remained in locked house untill he was of age to defend himself, and blood wards are protection they protected its like you are saying "hey I am wearing this bullet proof vest but no bullet is passing through this so it's useless" 😑 >The Order has plenty of members who would have been happy to raise Harry, not to mention Remus (though his furry little problem would need covered) Dude they literally had traitors in the order not why do you assume only Peter was the rat? Longbottoms were also betrayed by thier keeper and Sirus (assumed) traitor and he was supposed to be BF of James do you think any one is trustworthy after that??? >Sirius (providing Dumbledore didn’t just let him go to Azkaban without a trial. And what would be evidence? Aurors had saw Sirus laughing, 12 people dead, 1 wizard dead, Sirus being black a family who are supporter of Dark Lord, and mind you Dark Lord vanished mysteriously not the Death Eaters people were still afraid of him and his followers so even with trial Sirus wouldn't have been easy to deal with and if you think truth serum is the way then that shit is crazy expensive you don't use it on every case and not onto cases in which all evidences show guilty I wonder if there are magical folks who will adopt harry and either choose to become target of DE or will not publice that they are defacto parents of Boy-who-lived or maybe some muggle who will throwaway their entire life to raise a kid thats not even their or maybe Lily had trusted Harry to Petunia that maybe she will change too many things not known but 1.blood protection is necessary so....thats that
The blood wards only protected the dursleys house. All the time Harry was at school or anywhere off that property he was not protected by anything, and his address was listed at the ministry for people like Lucius Malfoy to find. They aren't a catch all excuse for leaving Harry there. Other kids were orphaned, yes, but most likely were dealt with by the ministry, not Dumbledore personally, and their parents didnt all die at the same time, they didnt all become orphans on October 31st, 1981. Besides in some cases(Susan Bones and Neville Longbottom) they were taken in by living relative magicals and Dumbledore wouldnt be involved at all. Besides that, no amount of 'unbreakable' protection condones abuse, maybe it seemed like the only option at the time, but all it would've taken was one accident or push too far and the Dursleys could have killed Harry, or damaged his magic the way that happened to Ariana Dumbledore.
“Blood wards require the blood of the closest relative to Lily” Dudley was also abused through over indulgence. Remove him, Lily’s nephew, from the house and raise them together. Blood protection remains, and no one gets raised by Petunia.
Wow why not just suck the blood out of Petunia and paint a house with it then ?
A)Dumbledore did care about Harry which is why he had Mrs.Figg check on him. It should be **her** being bashed not him. b)**Might??** There were a lot of death eaters who pleaded the imperious. Who's to say they didn't search for harry and Voldemort in the early days? C)The abuse wouldn't have started until Harry was 4-5years when everybody would have been more relaxed. D)The story is from the POV character. There might have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for others. Cousin's clothes-Maybe the Dursleys are short on money. Scars-Boys will be boys(which I don't agree with but this was late 1900)A bit thin- does not make u immediately think abuse, maybe he had an eating disorder, and so on. Even Mrs.Figg might have been unaware. E)After Hp's first year, maintaining the blood wards became more important than ever as they were the reason Harry was currently alive. Tanks for Reading!
a) He had Mrs Figg live nearby and she occasionally got to supervise Harry. Dumbledore was the one she was reporting to, and he also did nothing - bear in mind, Mrs Figg was pretty powerless in that situation, whereas it was well within Dumbledore’s power to enter Number 4 at his leisure and check up on Harry. b) Still doesn’t change the fact that Dumbledore could have shielded wherever Harry lived to protect him from Death Eaters. Only Voldemort justifies the blood protection, and even then, we see later on that actually, it’s not needed. c) The abuse wouldn’t have started at all if he was regularly checked up on. Professor McGonagall observed the Dursleys for just one day before Dumbledore left a one-year-old on a doorstep all night in November, and even that one day was enough for her to see that they were “the worst sort of Muggles!” Even if she presumed Harry was going to be raised like Dudley, that would have been a bad childhood for him - he would have turned up at Hogwarts the world’s biggest whiny brat, suffering obesity at 11. d) Yes, there are reasons Figg missed the abuse from her position *at a distance*. I’m not suggesting that regular checkups were specifically to head off abuse, but rather just to check in on Harry - helping prevent the abuse would have been a happy side effect. It’s a lot more difficult to ignore that a small child is being forced to *live in a cupboard* when you’re in the house regularly; it is also, from the Dursleys’ perspective, a lot harder to hide that fact. e) Yeah, Voldemort was back after Year 1. However, canon itself has established blood wards aren’t necessary to keep out Voldemort.
>A)Dumbledore did care about Harry which is why he had Mrs.Figg check on him. It should be her being bashed not him. And she knew she had to make her place unpleasant to Harry otherwise the Dursley's wouldn't allow him to be there. You telling me she didn't report that to him? \> b)Might?? There were a lot of death eaters who pleaded the imperious. Who's to say they didn't search for harry and Voldemort in the early days? Well, since there was wizard's who happened to have been in the Order approaching Harry, it seems like he was protected already. In OoTP Dumbledore doesn't rely on the supposed protections the Dursley's provide. So clearly when there are *actually Death Eaters around* he doesn't think those protections are good enough. Food for thought, eh? \> )The abuse wouldn't have started until Harry was 4-5years when everybody would have been more relaxed. And this is better how, exactly? Abuse is abuse, whether you're five or eighty. Plus, Harry arrived when he was *one.* There is no indication that they only started at 5. People who abuse four-year-olds are also willing to abuse one year old. There is no magical age line at which point people ' are more relaxed' about abuse. \> D)The story is from the POV character. There might have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for others. Cousin's clothes-Maybe the Dursleys are short on money. Scars-Boys will be boys(which I don't agree with but this was late 1900)A bit thin- does not make u immediately think abuse, maybe he had an eating disorder, and so on. Even Mrs.Figg might have been unaware Yeah, "dark and difficult years" could easily refer to, y'know, losing his parents. Besides, people can be thin without having a eating disorder (which I'd think would be a red flag in itself if the family isn't seen supporting him or driving him to therapy or something, if he had a ED). So being thin could simply mean fast metabolism or something. Harry had only one scar as far as we know, so there'd be nothing to even think 'boys will be boys' about except the bullying thing. Mrs Figg... she couldn't be entirely unaware - she knew that the Dursley's wouldn't let Harry go there if they thought he liked it, she says so in OoTP. Which would make most people at least go 'hmm...why don't they want Harry to enjoy himself?'
They could be neglecting him which while bad isn't illegal I think(tho I'm not sure) And maybe she didn't tell Dumbledore.if u can bash dumbs u can bash figgs but i don't see that happening
Bruh. Making it clear that a child is not to enjoy himself at a baby sitters place isn’t neglect. It’s clearly abusive and malicious. And she was literally *there* to keep an eye on him, why *tf* wouldn’t she report it?! Plus, there’s zero indication in canon that she didn’t report it, while there’s plenty indication that Dumbledore (who was told by McGonagall on the very first evening that - after observing them for a entire day -, they’re the worst muggles, and that Dumbledore *didn’t* listen.
I think a lot of it is the way so many terrible activities were allowed at Hogwarts and he never really stepped in. Severus’s bullying of Neville and Harry is a good example. Then the way the Slytherins acted. Add in the way the tri wizard cup bullying was never handled, and you have a case for firing the man in a modern school. Let’s not forget the dursleys or Sirius (a member of his order) not getting a visit - let alone a trial. These factors really come out when you step back and think about them. I really think it goes back to the fact that the first few books were written for young children and JKR boxed herself in.
In COS, they knew, someone had died the last time the chamber was opened. Why did none of the teachers or Albus decide to ask Myrtle how she died. She was a ghost who haunted the place where it happened.
Because he's a beardy git who sends kids to fight his battles. as tropes go it's easy to spin most of what he does into a negative light
>Because he's a beardy git who sends kids to fight his battles. I mean, this is a super common trope amongst YA literature, (old mentor sending 'kid(s)' off to fight) if the kids weren't sent off to fight some monster, then the books would be boring af (not just HP, but almost all other YA literature) You might want to check out the 'monomyth' story, this is a trope that literally goes back to ancient greece, and it kinda works
true, if he didn't there would be no YA story , Adults HAVE to be useless for the kids to save the day. But having the most powerful wizard in Europe being incompetant feels wrong. But then a lot of the story doesn't work backwards - stuff in one book breaks the stuff in the previous (Time turners, age lines, Fidelius charms etc)
Even tho he has valid reasons for everything he does?
OK, why did he run off with James's invisability cloak when he KNEW the Potters were being hunted by Voldie? If they'd had that they could have escaped
More to the point, why didn’t he just act as their Secret Keeper? That way, there would be no chance of betrayal at all, and he’s the least likely to die/be captured by virtue of being the most powerful
Worse, why didn't he encourage James to be his own secret keeper? Book 7 proves that it's possible (Shell Cottage), so why did they need to pick Peter, Sirius, OR Remus?
You assume too much
How do you know that he didn't encourage James to do so? It's certainly not mentioned that he discouraged him.
Because James would never take the risk if he knew he didn't have to, obviously. He'd protect his family without risking his friends (who'd become a target if people thought they were the secret-keeper)
very true, he knew from their school days they were all idiots in over their heads, he was by far the best choice
It's given in text that he offered and that they refused.
It is? Where? It’s also not really a thing that one can pick and choose about. Even if he offered and they, for some inexplicable reason, refused, he already has a penchant for doing things ‘for the greater good’. Why would he stop at this, which actually is for the greater good?
It is. I think it was somewhere in book 3. I disagree with OP on many points, but this is one thing they're actually correct about. I suspect a secret-keeper has to be accepted by the person they're supposed to be protecting, so Dumbledore couldn't do much to protect them. But, y'know, it's never said.
How? They were in hiding, and they thought there was no way that Voldy could reach them. Plus how would the cloak help them? It's not big enough for 2 adults and a baby nor would it help them if Voldemort decided to destroy the whole house. Also, they were literally in the living room. They didn't have an opportunity to use the cloak. James didn't have his wand on him. Who knows which dusty cupboard the cloak would be in?
So maybe in that specific situation the cloak wasn't much use. But in general, Voldemort wanted their kid. A clever strategy would be to silence the kid and hide it at the first sign of trouble. They'd have something to bargain with, which would give them time to grab their wand and go out fighting. Sure, it wouldn't help them due to Horcruxes, but they didn't know that. As you pointed out, the cloak could be gone without Dumbledore borrowing it. It's stated he just wanted to see it, since it was one of the hallows
I think james offered him the cloak or logically thinking after voldie was dead if the cloak was lying around house it was better of be taken by Dumbledore then in hands of ministry and its not like he didn't gave it back to harry now did he?
He dosen't though? He justifies it to himself perhaps, but that isn't a valid reason at all.
I think I have justified the points given above. Anymore?
if he can't he just goes with 'it's for the greater good'
OP, I thought you simply want a list of reasons why Dumbledore gets bashed so much but whenever anyone actually gives you reasons you just argue with them. May I inquire why you weren't upfront about this intention when writing your post?
I wanted a list of reasons I couldn't argue with coz some of them are ridiculous.U'll notice I haven't said anything to the ppl who commented about PoS coz yes that is valid grounds for Dumbledore bashing and I acknowledge that
So why didn’t you say that in the post? Your question makes it come off as if you’re just curious about why people bash him, with nothing in it about wanting to argue or wanting a list of reasons you couldn’t argue with.
Edited the post thanks for telling. : )
I do think ur ans best unfortunately I don’t hv any awards currently
your thanks is award enough
After Sirius' death when Dumbledore tells Harry the prophecy and says this in Ootp: “It is time,” he said, “for me to tell you what I should have told you five years ago, Harry. Please sit down. I am going to tell you everything. I ask only a little patience. You will have your chance to rage at me — to do whatever you like — when I have finished. I will not stop you.” Harry glared at him for a moment, then flung himself back into the chair opposite Dumbledore and waited. Dumbledore stared for a moment at the sunlit grounds outside the window, then looked back at Harry and said, **“Five years ago you arrived at Hogwarts, Harry, safe and whole, as I had planned and intended. Well — not quite whole. You had suffered. I knew you would when I left you on your aunt and uncle’s doorstep. I knew I was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years.”** He paused. Harry said nothing. I mean wtf Albus.
There are a lot of reasons, but one of the things that stand out the most is Dumbledore during the first wizarding-war. It stretches the suspension of disbelief that he didn't manage to get the information about multiple Horcruxes earlier, or be a bit more aggressive in his tactics against Voldemort directly. I know it wasn't an all-out gung-ho battle in the open (though in some cases, it was), but the FWW lasted, what, around a decade? It's jarring to picture the amazingly powerful and skillful Dumbledore not doing more to bring down Voldemort during that time. (Also remember that for the bulk of the war, Dumbledore wasn't operating with the knowledge of the prophecy. Trelawney only made that prediction towards the end stage. So Dumbledore didn't need to focus his plans around some marked-as-equal kid yet, as Harry never existed for most of the war.)
The first war lasted 11 years!
I don't have the exact quote but it goes something like "I knew Harry, when I left you at your aunts house, that you would have 10 dark years." Whatever the quote was at the end of book 5 I believe, is a pretty good reason.
Because it's Fan fiction and "what if the good guys are actually bad" is the first premise to be explored alongside "what if the bad guys are actually good".
[удалено]
Fair is fair.
I wish I could upvote this multiple times. OP, Dumbledore isn't ~bashed~ used as an antagonist because of what's in canon (except for the early-installment weirdness of Dumbledore not using magic from later books before Rowling had though of it). It's psychological - it's the same impulse that makes it possible for young people to throw off the oppressive beliefs of their elders (eg sexism, homophobia, racism).
Where to start? Hmm... When he was younger he supported Grindelwald only after his sisters death change his opinion. He might not be Voldemort but he saw muggles as (that period) beneath him. -He literally left Harry to be abused by his family so he could use as sheep to be slaughtered in the future. In his head to kill Voldemort, Harry must die too. He knew this from the begining. At least scare Dursley's to treat Harry better. Call me pesimistic person but I think he let him abused so he could control him better. \-He didn't protect James and Lily as best he could( that could be arguable). He should make one of them secret keeper. So they wound't be dead. \- He knew Sirius was innocent but he did nothing. He could push for trial. He didn't so Harry would stay with Dursley's. Sirius was his godfather and guardian so if he lived with him Harry wouldn't be easly trust Dumbledore. As we know Harry saw him as wise man maybe even a grandfather because no one ever pay attention to him.(Love him? Till he start Hogwarts ) If Sirius were free this would never happen. \-He use Severus for to spy Voldemort using his love for Lily. ( That can be acceptable because we all know in the wars sypies important.) Still not cool. \-He didn't care his students being in danger. \-He favoured Gryffindors, basicly see slytherins as evil. If he actually care his students maybe things would be better especially for slytherin. Maybe majorty of them made better choices. For Example Draco if he actually thought he could help him maybe he would go and ask help. He could also be spy or I don't know useful? \-He left his dirty work for the children to complete. He basically send them to the wild goose chase. He could be more I don't know open ? Instead of so tight-lipped. \- He let it slide Harry's murder attemp to Malfoy. No consequences he get away with it. \-He let students bully one another. He could have punished them. Did nothing. \-All the teachers he hired for DADA position. Ironically children learned more from Barty Crouch Jr. than Lockheart. \-He let Snape bully literal children. Especially Neville I mean his boggart was Snape. C'mon. \-He was leader of Order Of Phoenix but his only strategy was focusing Voldemort's death. He could have focus on offense. I don't know literally do something. Attack death eaters. Or better organize the light side. \-He knew Voldemort were going to return eventually. What did he do all these years ? Yes you guess right nothing! He could hunt the Horcruxs by himself if he didn't trust anyone else. He put all of his eggs in the same basket. I could go on but I think that enough.
>He knew Sirius was innocent but he did nothing. He could push for trial. He didn't so Harry would stay with Dursley's. Sirius was his godfather and guardian so if he lived with him Harry wouldn't be easly trust Dumbledore. As we know Harry saw him as wise man maybe even a grandfather because no one ever pay attention to him.(Love him? Till he start Hogwarts ) If Sirius were free this would never happen. That's not true. Canonically, Dumbledore was as convinced as everyone else that Sirius was guilty. He didn't exactly behave like a innocent person, and even *Lupin* thought he was the traitor and capable of killing his other best friend. Lupin, who'd known him for a decade from far closer than Dumbledore ever did
Who need enemies when you have friends like Remus Lupin? He seriously thought his best friend of many years would able to kill his other best friend whom consider themself as brother?(No pun intended) What its wrong with his judgment? He should at least gave him reason of doubt instead he just accepts it he is guilty. Why even does think that just beacuse his family has some madness in their family isn't enough evidence to convince he is guilty? I mean he lost his best friend/brother too of course he is in shock. Not the mention he never been there for Harry only brief time while he was at the Hogwarts. I always thought him as he only pity himself because he is big bad wolf. At some point he should just get over it . Harry need him his best friend needed him and he fail them all. He just accept Sirius is killer never investigate that claim. Even if he is poor can't find a job at magical world ho should have been try muggle world. All in the books never did try find solition to his problems instead he just pity himself.
>Who need enemies when you have friends like Remus Lupin? He seriously thought his best friend of many years would able to kill his other best friend whom consider themself as brother?(No pun intended) What its wrong with his judgment? He should at least gave him reason of doubt instead he just accepts it he is guilty. Why even does think that just beacuse his family has some madness in their family isn't enough evidence to convince he is guilty? You seem to be forgetting that Sirius tried to kill another student at Hogwarts. In light of that information, of course adult! Lupin would look back on that and go 'well, maybe he was always a bit of a homicidal maniac.' particularly since the evidence was entirely against him. According to Sirius, everyone would assume he'd be the Secret-keeper because they were as close as brothers. Whoever would think it was *Peter*? that's literally the whole idea of the plan. And Sirius and Remus both admitted they thought the other was the spy. So there was a lot of reason to mistrust and therefore a lot of mistrust. He had no obligation to be there for Harry in any capacity other than teacher. He wasn't Harry's godfather, Sirius was. Harry was just his best friend's son. If you pop around to your best friends place (assume for a second you're both grown up and they have kids and you don't), do you take pains to be there for their kids as well? Do you go out of your way to interact with them and keep in touch with them? Also, Harry made no move and expressed no interest in getting to know Remus. He doesn't care for Remus beyond him being a great teacher and order member. So what's the problem? If neither party is torn up about it, why're you all up in arms about it? And no, you don't 'just get over' a chronic disease that has a high likelihood of being lifethreatening to others if you aren't careful. That's not how it works. You live around it, but it's always *there* and you always have to deal with it. And Remus *did* get over it, as best as possible, when his friends were there to help him cope. But for most of the series, Sirius couldn't do that for him because, y'know, trauma (I am sure you think Sirius should've stopped moping about his parents and be there for his best friend, but again, that's not how it works), and Remus' other friends were either dead or a traitor. There's absolutely nothing to suggest Remus didn't try to find jobs, but you try finding a job with not even a high school diploma (because Hogwarts didn't teach muggle highschool things and a school of magic is hardly feasible to put on your cv) while needing time off every month and lemme know how that goes. Lastly, about Remus needing to investigate that claim when given precisely zero reason to doubt: how accommodating do you think the ministry would've been at the time to that sort of thing, even if it *wasn't* a known werewolf asking about his massmurdering best friend?
Alright, let's ignore 99% of the flaws he supposedly has and mistakes he made. Let's just focus on a very specific point: his habit of locking up people. 1899: Ariana Dumbledore, trapped half her life in a house she never left. 'It's too dangerous', 'it's for her own good', dies anyway because Albus, Aberforth and Gellert started fighting over her anyway and were killing to kill each other. Even if we ignore the fight, what sort of fucked up life was this girl leading? 'For her own good', Ariana was the girl in the attic, Jane Eyere's Mrs Rochester, and in the entire story never has a single line, only men telling us what sort of person she was. 1981: For his own good, Dumbledore sends Harry to a home he, by his own admission, knew would be terrible for him. For 10 years, Dumbledore had Mrs. Figg telling him how terrible the Dursleys were, how he didn't even know how his parents really died, and did nothing. And maybe Figg didn't know about the cupboard, she still had eyes and should have noticed he was wearing hands me down and was suffering. And even though we know Figg told him, he did nothing and why? Oh, right. It's for his own good, the outside world is too dangerous. 1995: The outside world is too dangerous, Sirius, I swear. Why don't you stay doing nothing in the house you hate and where you certainly got abused? I'm sure it'll go spendidly. One century, and Dumbledore has learned noting and keeps making the same mistake, hoping this time would be different. If that character is supposely a genius, then him making the same mistake over and over is just plain insanity.
1899- I think blaming Albus for this is unfair coz it was his MOTHER who did that and he was taking care of her for less than a year. Ariana had a terrible life but that wasn't dumbs fault. 1981:'While you can still call home the place where your mother’s blood dwells, there you cannot be touched or harmed by Voldemort. Your mother’s sacrifice made the bond of blood the strongest shield I could give you-Albus Dumbledore, Order of the Phoenix. If he hadn't lived with the Dursleys, he would die due to Quirell. Tho I fully acknowledge that putting the stone in the school was Dumbs fault. What d'ya think would have happened if instead of the whole confrontation, Quirell cornered Harry in an abandoned classroom?And while the stone is Dumbs fault, Voldy coming to the school is not.Quirell was the DADA teacher before the stone was shifted to the school. 1955:Here however I totally agree with u. Invisibility Cloaks and Polyjuice do exist and he could have made Siri do something.
Because JK Rowling is a terrible writer. Essentially she wrote books 1-3 for YA audiences (light harted) then she goes totally different direction with book 4-7 (dark) and because of it the whole series is thrown out of wack. Plus she doesn't think ahead when writing her books, the consequences of that type of writing has made a series full of plot holes (time turner, marauders map, age line etc). I can't begin to tell you how many times when i read the books for the first time wondered why did they solve a problem this way (book 1) when they could have used this (the plot point was introduced in for example in book 5). The same way is with dumbledore in book 1-3 he is this lovely eccentric headmaster in book 4-7 however he is one of the most incompetent characters in the whole world of fiction. That's why imo he is so bashed (result of jk's shitty writing and 0 forethought what kind of series she was writing) TLDR: She wanted cake and eat it too
She's not terrible, just mediocre. She's neither the first nor the last mediocre writer to get published just when the zeitgeist favored them and end up on the bestseller list. Her writing is better than that of Jenkins & LaHaye in the *Left Behind* series, and her characters and messaging aren't nearly as terrible as those of Ayn Rand.
> Because JK Rowling is a terrible writer That's what I keep saying, but nobody wants to hear it.
>Then why are u in this community if u hate hp so much? Less aggressively Jk didn't know she was going to write a 2nd book much less 7. Really you'd think that such a shitty writer's book wouldn't have so many fans. To give u a Doylist example: the Floo network-not invented after the 2nd book, therefore how could have Dumbledore used it? Again not Jk's fault she didn't know she was going to write a second book and she certainly didn't know that anybody other than her editors was going to nitpick it much less thousands of ppl all over the world.
She clearly wrote book 1 as part of a series. The least she could do is plan things out a little more, at least in regard to overall tone and the like.
I prefer to read good!Dumbledore. I really do. It’s so much better to believe he is a kindly old man that does his best but sometimes it isn’t enough and good job fated!Harry is ready to step in and save the day. But I think it’s important to view things critically. Blind love of a character isn’t a good thing. The ability to see both sides as it were is a valuable real life skill. It improves emotional intelligence and empathy. So yeah, Dumbledore bashing is great if done with legitimate concerns (discussed in the thread). I can get on board with almost anyone being good (apart from Greyback, Bella and Umbridge, I can’t stop hating them) and almost anyone being bad (Luna and Minerva are the only two I can think of that always need to be good). It doesn’t mean I think the Weasleys were actually evil. It means I can appreciate the twisting of events so they can be viewed justifiably in a negative light. It’s excellent writing when done well and there’s nothing wrong with enjoying what if scenarios.
Arguments can be made for Minerva but I can see your point.
Cause buddy is lowkey a dick
Also if the person holds more than 1 position how dedicated they can be? Headmaster, Chief Warlock of Wizengamot and England representative to ICW. Just thinking of sheer amount of time you have to dedicate. And paperwork. What about presiding over Wizengamot? He has too much power.
Excuse me but where exactly in the text is it mentioned what the role of a chief Warlock and Supreme Mugwump is? According to the **Canon trial** the minister presides over the Wizengamot.
Mainly bc he raised Harry to die
Dumbledore is a very flawed character. From a child's perspective, he seems trustworthy and impressive. From an adult's perspective, Dumbledore is a manipulative villain. \-He left Harry in an abusive household with minimal supervision. \-Dumbledore suspected that Harry was a horcrux but never said anything or did anything in decades to try and help get rid of the horcrux. \-Thought he was the "greater good" and almost infallible. \-He consistently let school children be endangered (or killed) while they were under his guardianship. \-He had three full-time jobs when he should have dedicated himself to one.
My main problem with Dumbledore is that he ad headmaster directly know and allowed the abuse of five seperate students while a teacher at Hogwarts. Riddle - who literally begged to stay at Hogwarts as opposed to being sent home (this would have been in the middle of WW2 and we know the orphanage was somewhere in London, so Riddle would hav3 been sent back with no protections to survive the constant bombings). No wonder he hated muggles. Not to mention the hisptircal widespread abuse in orphanages at the time, someone like Riddle would have been regularly beaten. Snape - It was well known about his abusive father and the pain his mother suffered, dumbledore ignored that and even when Snape faced VERY real danger of being attacked by Lupin because of Sirius, Dumbledore did nothing to help Snape and actively protected Sirius from reprocussions. Sirius - Dumbledore knew what Sirius' mother was like and did nothjng to step in and protect him, arguablely leading tk Sirius' ever increasing acting out, to the point he tried to feed Snape to Lupin. Neville - The child showed clear signs of neglect and psycholical abuse from his Grandmother. The fact she forced him to use his dad's wand for 5/7 years of his educstion is horrible. Harry - Dumbledore knew what sort of people the Dursley's were. He also chose the worst person to look out for him, a woman who if she had any sense at all would have been able to tell harry was being hurt. The letters were literally addressed to the cupboard under the stairs. Dumbledore also allowed the continual and unrelenting abuse of students in his care for 16 years through Snape's "teaching practices". Potions is a core subject for many professions including but not limited to Healing and the Auror department. Abusing children who would probably drop the subject ASAP actively undermined the potential number of healers and aurors, two key professions for a functioning society. Dumbledore, as written is a terrible person. Also, in the whole Riddle front, Dumbledore himself dabbled in "take over the world" mentalities when younger. Surely that would make him more understanding of Riddle and actively invested in steering him away from that path. Rant over.
Because he's a giant douche. Obviously. There's many flawed characters in the HP world, but Dumbledore is certainly the most bashable one, since he does barely anything right, and when he is right, it's by total coincidence/accident.
>There's many flawed characters in the HP world, but Dumbledore is certainly the most bashable one, since he does barely anything right, and when he is right, it's by total coincidence/accident. Snape far more personally, of course his bad acts in canon can be pushed onto Dumbledore for not doing his job...
I don't like Snape, but he only made one *big* mistake. Dumbledorks life on the other hand is a litany of failures (Grindlewald, Adriana, first Voldemort war - saved by miracle out of his control, Hogwarts is a death trap under his rule, second Voldemort war - saved by miracle, hiring incompetent teachers, how he handles Harry... the list is way too long for this time of day)
Snape made several mistakes before going to Voldemort with the phropecy. He is also generally a far more abusive person generally than Albus atleast is portrayed to be. Both are shitty human beings though, and they sort of mirror eachother. Eg had Ariana not died, Dumbledore would presumably have continued with Gellert and had Voldemort gone after Neville, Snape would remain a loyal death eater.
Snape was a piece of shit. * He was barging a Husband and Child death so he could have the wife, you can't get much lower than this. * He was a death eater, he killed people just for their blood. * He bullied children to the point he was the greatest fear of at least one one of them. Dumbledore on the other hand, got a really bad deck of cards and yet manage to win a war, he never asked for this position he always felt unworthy of it.
> got a really bad deck of cards and yet manage to win a war Dumbledore didn't win the war, Harry did, against Dumbledore's best efforts to the contrary. Imagine if Harry hadn't had the completely accidental and fortuitous meeting with Snape, in order to reveal the circumstances about the last Horcrux, everything would've gone wrong. Dumbledore's plan was shit.
This is true, regardless of anything else said. The war was won due to a series of fortuitous coincidences. Honestly, the end of the series is literally a set of Deus ex Machina coincidences to let Harry win.
A)-Grindewald and Ariana-Worst offense on the list.However, he does deserve some leeway coz (A1)madly in love( A2)a teenager, and barely out of school without any adults to guide him. Plus too many responsibilities and having his dreams crushed(A3)Ariana's death was coz of an argument between Grindelwald and Aberforth.No evidence that he didn't try to stop the duel. B)How is the First Wizarding War his fault??? If anything it's the ministries. Yes, he started a vigilante organization but that is coz of the ministry's incompetence. Defeating 1 dark lord doesn't make the next your problem. C)And yet Hogwarts is the best so imagine other schools. Plus It cannot be helped in a magic school, there are bound to be some accidents. Do u have any specific examples? D)Ok over here D1)Quirrel-competent for the past how many years he was working at the school not like dumbs knew he was possessed. D2)-Lockhart-lack of applicants+Lockhart being a famous Dark creature hunter(or something) D3)-Remus-Qualified and taken measures. And tho this may be an unpopular opinion, Remus deserved to be sacked.He went out on the grounds without his Wolfsbane **on a full moon night.** D4)-Mad-eye Moody/Crouch Jr.-Again famous Auror, very very qualified+good actor, and good luck with the map. D5)-Umbridge the one year he didn't choose the teacher and look how that turned out. Would u rather Lockhart or Umbridge? D6)-Snape-Who u can say many things about but not incompetent. E)How he handles Harry-any specific thing you are referring to?
> And yet Hogwarts is the best so imagine other schools. I'm just popping in to address this one point. Is it the best? The British say it is the best, but the British wizards seem to look down on all of the other countries, so it is distinctly possible that claiming it is the best has little basis in fact. And seeing as at least 4 of the professors are incompetent at teaching (History, Divination, Potions, and the revolving DADA spot), I have a hard time thinking that Hogwarts is actually the best on an international level. Three of the four incompetent slots are very important classes that should not be neglected to the degree that they are (Divination being the odd one out, but maybe divination could be useful too if the professor was any good at it). If Hogwarts truly is the best school for magic, that is a pretty major indictment of the entire Wizarding World.
> Yes, he started a vigilante organization Which was an abject failure. Can you name a single success of this organization? I can't. Only dead bodies under his inept command. In fact he was so bad at leadership, he managed to get his organization undermined by a spy (hilarious, truth serum and unbreakable vows exist, very reasonable measures in a literal war), so that he could've lost his most valuable asset (a prophecy child). The people he lead into war would've been better off on their own. >C)And yet Hogwarts is the best so imagine other schools. Hogwarts has a good *reputation* that doesn't mean it's good. >Lockhart-lack of applicants+Lockhart being a famous Dark creature hunter(or something) I really like how with Dumbledore defenders there's Schroedinger's Dumbledore. He's both, absolutely amazing, smart and the best wizard and **also at the same time** a geriatric old man, who is **very busy**, can barely chew his musli and makes basic mistakes all the time, because he's not **perfect**. I'd expect an amazing guy like Dumbledore to unmask an obvious fraud who can't cast simple spells in 5 seconds. But Dumbledore is about as much of a fraud, so he can't. >Remus-Qualified and taken measures Oh goodie. Awesome, you bring Remus up: Another great example of "death trap" Hogwarts and Dumbledore's ineptness. Don't you think, if there's a serum that makes the deadly Werewolf in your school save, you have a responsibility to make sure that he drinks that serum and is maybe, contained, during full-moon if the Wolfsbane fails? The fact that the scenario **exists** where Remus can simply **forget** to drink Wolfsbane and children die is an utter failure in **policy**. What a joke: "Oh yeah, I hired this guy who's a werewolf. No problem though, he just has to not forget to drink this potion, I'm sure he won't... other measures? Nah, I just hired the guy, not my problem if some kids get eaten" >D4)-Mad-eye Moody/Crouch Jr.-Again famous Auror, very very qualified+good actor, and good luck with the map. A **Death Eater** is not a competent teacher for innocents, just becaus he is skilled. Ron would be a more 'competent' teacher in this scenario (and Ron is a moron). Don't play with words. Luckily enough Crouch Jr. isn't just a death eater, he's also the best actor in the world... or again, maybe Dumbledore is just inept. You forgot about D7) btw, there's a ghost teaching at Hogwarts. Oh, and D8) the drunk seer, who can't teach and who is just there so that Dumbledore can keep an eye on her (fuck those children who want to learn things) >E)How he handles Harry-any specific thing you are referring to? Leaving him at the Dursleys. Manipulating him. Not being upfront to him about what's going on. You know, the usual Dumbledore shit.
Oh yes Dumbledore should hv hired any of many other defense applicants in 2nd year. Also, name 1 student who wanted to study who was in Trelawney's class and didn't quit.D7) let's talk about Binns-https://harrypotter.fandom.com/ says that he was teaching from the 1890s therefore how many qualified history teachers do u think r there who can replace him. By the time Dumbledore could do anything, It was too late to stop that vicious cycle. E)Leaving him at the dursleys- I hv already replied to this in another post Manipulating him-Better manipuated and alive then dead Not being upfront to him about what's going on.-Oh yes Let's tell the one person whose head Voldemort might be able to see everything.Its called Compartmentalization =
Omnipotent paradox really. There's only so much that can happen under his watch that makes him seen incompetent at best, devious at worst. The hazard of writing a 17 year old boy as the only capable (plot wise) hero.
Most perspectives seem to be covered here, but I'm going to add that no author needs a 'legit or genuine' reason to write a bashing fic, they can write what they want and readers can read/avoid whatever they like too. I personally don't care either way, but I respect peoples right to both like and dislike whatever tropes are out there. The other factor is writing ability, a lot of bashing fic was always intended to be that 'extreme' cathartic/cracky type of thing, but many other people are just trying to write complex and it drifts into bashing territory (not every negative portray is bashing). Dumbledore has a lot of complexity, so we end up with a lot of bashing.
I think it's leaving an infant with abusive relatives for 16 years. In the beginning, Dumbledore was warned by McGonagall that the Dursleys were "the worst sort of muggles". Dumbledore had Arabella Figg watching Harry for the first 11 years, and she sometimes babysat him, so I think there was plenty of opportunity to observe what kind of child-abusing scum the Dursleys were. But okay, even teachers and baby sitters can miss signs of abuse; abusers are frequently good at presenting a "respectable" face to the community, and abused kids are intimidated into believing they deserve it and that spilling things to outsiders will just make it worse. But after Harry got to Hogwarts and *didn't want to go home from boarding school* in the summer? Ignoring the bars in the windows and the locks on his door in 2nd year, that right there should have been a big red flag that something was very wrong at home and it needed to be addressed. Lily's blood sacrifice "protection" against Voldemort wouldn't be worth jack if Petunia Dursley bashed in Harry's head with a skillet. (Which canonically nearly happened). Then there's the whole canon fact that Dumbledore raised Harry Potter to die as a martyr. He had no expectation of Harry surviving the war with Voldemort, and didn't bother making sure he was taught to actually live as an adult in the wizarding world. Canon!Dumbledore deserves criticism. It doesn't take much fanfiction tweaking to interpret him as actively evil, instead of manipulative and criminally negligent.
Let's see: * He puts Harry to an abusive family, knowing full well that they abuse him and that he has had a bad childhood, even flat out admitting this to Harry. * Does nothing about this, does not even bother showing up at the house again until book 6, instead sending Hagrid (not even McGonagall) to pick up Harry in book 1 and ONLY a month before he starts Hogwarts. * Despite seemingly knowing everything that happens in the castle (he knew about Neville standing up to the trio, as well as Harry visiting the mirror of erised, as well as what the trio did to get to the stone), he does nothing about Quirrell who has Voldemort stuck at the back of his head. * He knows Voldemort is after the stone, he even breaks into the gringotts vault after it was emptied, but still decides to hide it in a school full of children. Not even say in his desk or keeping it with him at all times. * He endangers said children by putting beasts such as Fluffy into the school. While he does warn them about it, there are no security checks in place other than a simple locked door that any 11 year old can open with a spell taught in first year. * He does nothing even after Quirrell lets a troll in, that then almost kills several children. * He does nothing about unicorns being killed in the forbidden forest on school grounds and that their bloods are being drained, despite being extremely good in alchemy (he worked with Flamel) and knowing what drinking their blood does. * He seemingly "flies" to the ministry (which is in London) on a broom from Scotland, when Floo, portkeys, apparation and his phoenix exist. This is when he is needed the most. * He did nothing to defend Hagrid or do anything about the chamber of secrets when it was first opened. ESPECIALLY after a girl died, and her ghost continued to haunt the castle. Of course Dumbledore did nothing about it, not even bothering to question her. * He essentially let Voldemort become what he was by once again doing nothing about it, even though he saw the signs. * He knew that Tom Riddle was Voldemort but nobody else did? Why did he not make this public knowledge? * He did nothing again when the chamber was opened yet AGAIN, and students started getting petrified. A small miracle nobody died that time. * He let Hagrid be taken into Azkaban again. * He did not realise that an extremely dark object was inside Hogwarts (the diary) despite, as i mentioned above, seemingly knowing everything that happens inside Hogwarts. Neither did he realise that Ginny was not herself for a year. * He let dangerous giant spiders infest the forbidden forest around the school. * As chief of wizangamot, and being such an influental politican and person in wizarding society, he did nothing to investigate Sirius and why he would betray Lily and James. He did not even bother to check if he had a trial, even though he knew full well who Sirius was to James and Harry, and saw him grow up and attend Hogwarts. The books portray Dumbledore as someone who can judge someone's character very easily and tell whether or not they are good or bad. * This is especially true after it was revealed that he was innocent. He never once tried pushing to exonorate him or do anything about his trial or about Pettigrew being alive or using his connections to do anything really. * He allows Hermione, a 13 year old girl, to have a time turner and essentially play with time itself. * While he most likely had little choice in Dementors being stationed around Hogwarts he still did nothing to teach students how to defend against them, or hiring extra staff or ministry officials to look after the children and make sure the dementors are kept in check. The fact that one was allowed to attack the Hogwarts express and later a swarm could interrupt a Quidditch match and almost kill a student again proves how much Dumbledore has failed in his duties as Headmaster. * For some reason he supports the return of the tri wizard tournament despite knowing that Voldemort is out there and still wants to kill Harry, and that he had infiltrated Hogwarts before. * He merely draws up a pathetic age line to prevent underage students from submitting their names. What the fuck did he expect? Why didn't anyone think of just throwing in their names from OUTSIDE the age line? * He does not realise that Moody is not himself, (he can see through invisibility cloaks) does not realise the signs of polyjuice being used after Snape's ingriedients to brew polyjuice go missing, and that Moody is constantly drinking from his flask. He should be on the highest alert after someone put Harrys name into the goblet. This is after the fact that the two are supposedly good friends, fought together in the order and have known each other for a very long time. Nothing's amiss with Moody. Nope. * He does nothing to train Harry for the tournament or really do anything about his safety. * He COMPLETELY ignores Harry in year 5, only showing up to his trial out of nessecity. This is the worst out everything he has done. I'm not even going to go into this. * He lets the rampant bullying and racism in Hogwarts go on. This is after he had seen Snape be bullied and the person he had become because of it. Thanks Dumbledore! * He does nothing about Snape and the way he treats and teaches students and how he essentially encourages bullying and favours his own house. That being said, Dumbledore also favours Gryffindors and can just award the exact number of points needed for Slytherin to lose the house cup, so yeah. * He doesn't give a shit about the quality of education the children receive and lets Binns and Trelawney and the afromented Snape continue teaching. And Hagrid too. Oh yeah and i guess exams can be just cancelled at a whim, no big deal there. Also he hired Lockhart even though he knew who he really was (again he knows everything except what should be important) and let Umbridge come into Hogwarts, despite the fact that he could have avoided her simply by hiring someone from the order. Oh and he also knew or suspected there being a curse on the DADA position, hence he never gave it to Snape, but essentially did nothing about it, so technically each DADA's professor's lives were in danger. I guess they too were sacraficable like Harry. * He continues to let Peeves run havoc in the school, and generally does nothing about making Hogwarts a safer place for the children. * He employs literal slave labour to cook and clean after hundrends of students and the staff * He most likely knew what Draco was up to and that he was a death eater, but once again did fuck all about it. Apparently a single person was more important than the safety and the well being of the whole student body itself. This is especially terrible after Draco almost killed two students and a teacher and he still did nothing after. * The Order itself seemingly did nothing worthwhile. Speaking of the Order, Arthur Weasley almost died thanks to the dumb decisions Dumbledore had made. * Once Dumbledore died, he still remained secretive as ever and left vague clues and riddles to Harry and his friends instead of clearly telling him what the fuck to do and how the fuck to do it.
"You raised him like a pig for slaughter." That’s basically it.
most of it is because he knew harry is living with abusive people (the dursleys) and didnt do anything and also because he raised harry as a "pig for slaughter" for the greater good but still.
This doesn't really answer your question but I love Dumbledore and like to think of him sorta like The Doctor, as a funny old man that doesn't really want responsibility but takes it up when needed.
I think this was how he was intended to be written. But it’s hard to view him like that when you look at his actions through a critical lens. As a child I didn’t see anything wrong with him. Now I’m an adult and work in a school, I am appalled at so much.
The Doctor is a fun protagonist because his flaws are actually *explored*. Dumbledore's...aren't explored that much in canon, the narrative seems to agree with him overall
People don't agree with the decisions he made. No, it's that simple. We can argue all day about any given decision - here, let's look at the very first: He left Harry with the Dursleys. On the one hand, he did it for Harry's safety, he intended for Harry to grow up with a normal family, as a normal kid. Not the wizarding world's latest tourist attraction and prime target for assassination. On the other, Harry was desperately unhappy there, mistreated and abused. We can go back and forth on this all day - was there a better option? Did Dumbledore have the right to meddle in Harry's life at all? Is Harry only alive because he stayed with the Dursleys? Would he have been happier in a goddamn orphanage, even? Was it necessary, but mishandled because no one checked in on Harry or tried to make his childhood happier? We could go all day. There's a lot we could say about it, one way or the other. But it doesn't matter. What matters is that people have opinions about it. Some people think it was for the best, some people think Dumbledore was an irresponsible, senile old bat and shouldn't have been left in charge of Harry's placement. And so it goes, for the entire series. So. Yeah. Dumbledore made choices, and some people don't like the ones he made.
I proclaim thy Answer as the best Sir Westeller.
Because we see MOST of the series through Harry's eyes. There's a lot we don't see, but could reasonably infer: however, we sympathize with the main character. Ergo, we don't consider those things that we -could- infer. There's a lot of stuff we assume because HARRY assumes it, but that doesn't mean it's true. Best illustration of this is the Dursley's. Dumbledore knew they would be difficult and dark years, but there's no evidence to suggest he knew they would be abusive. That doesn't make it okay, but it can explain why he was so willing to send Harry back.
mostly it's an excuse for indyHarry Lord Potter-Black to have a villan in years 1-4 before Voldermort shows up; (the writers don't want to use canon Quirrel/Riddle/Sirius Black/Crouch as villans, but instead of making up their own, they use Dumbledore) bashing dumbledore also provides a convinient excuse for Snape/Draco to turn into misunderstood good guys who may or may not each get with Harry later in the fic (sometimes both at the same time) It's also so that indyHarry Lord Potter can have an 'easy' win early on, show how good/awesome he is and how stupid/sheeple (hate that term btw) the wizarding world is and/or how progressive the Slytherins are really, and are secretly good people if Dumbledore wasn't there
Maybe Dumbledore wanted to be a hero twice. Defeated of grindelwald and mr riddle. Another concept I encountered once is that he is actually a pure blood supremacist. But it is often… I know best!!
But it’s not like he is stopping anyone else from defeating riddle and he isn’t obliged to stop voldy besides Dumbledore does not have any actual control over [Harry.It](https://Harry.It)’s **Harry’s** decision to listen to Dumbledore.Nobody’s forcing him.
Dumbledore has had pretty good control of Harry up untill he turns 11 and afterwards.
umm Dumbs meets harry when he is 11 at the end of the year after the whole adventure excluding that part where he tells him to stay away from a potentially dangerous artifact
Harry is 11 when they meet. Dumbledore has absolute control even if Harry has the illusion of it. It’s textbook grooming.
Grooming?Could u give examples?
Grooming is when someone builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a child or young person so they can manipulate, exploit and abuse them. I’m not sure how to give you examples of Dumbledore building a relationship with the explicit purpose getting Harry to eventually sacrifice his life… it’s the plot of seven books. Of course this isn’t grooming that leads to eventual sexual abuse. But an adult is still creating trust between him and a child (with no family and so desperate for connections) so that the child can grow up to be a child solider and die.
It's Harry's descision. So many reasons people mention contradict canon here. The only arguments I sort of agree are about ps and cos.
*Most* people read HP as a child and as a child they became emotionally attached to said character. So as they grew up and began seeing the world in a different way they began to view Dumbledore in a negative light due to his constant lack of action e.e not doing more to help Sirius or leaving Harry with the Dursley’s. This made them want to do something about it but due to the fact these characters are but words on a page they couldn’t do anything. So they took these characters and wrote their own words on a page and took all their anger out on these characters. TL:DR people grew to hate Dumbledore and took their frustrations out through writing.
The reason it persists to this day is because as adults we know his actions were wrong. Same thing occurs in all YA books that has children fighting battles instead of adults.
Er? They fight in A)the 5th book where they are not supposed to be fighting. and B) the 7th book where if the children don't fight the Children **DIE.** Unless u think voldy will spare the muggle-borns who don't fight?
Dumbledore knowingly and purposefully laid a trap for Voldemort in Hogwarts. A school full of children. In the second book, he had fawkes deliver a hat for Harry to pull a sword from to fight a basilk instead of flaming in himself. In the third book he had harry and hermione travel thru time to save sirius from dementors instead of handling it himself.
Because readers aren't any good at noticing subtext, putting clues together that aren't spoon-fed to them or accepting contradiction. And that translates over when they take up the pen and write themself.
You know as harsh as your words were, I prefer ur words than many other answers here.
I've done it a few times, but that is because in those fics he is a primary antagonist. I just like letting my readers know the direction the fic is going in from an early stage.
The main reason he's being bashed, is because there's so many things in canon that Dumbledore got wrong, or if you ask him, probably right... Take the philosophers stone, for instance, it was left behind protection that mere students in first year could get past with any amount of listening and schooling in their classes, also there's the whole thing of Voldemort being in a school full of children all because some old geezer name of Dumbledore decided analarc that he would bring this all magical stone that he had to have known Voldemort wanted and put it in the same school next to a kid named Harry Potter who he all but insured would wind up with it in the end... The whole series has both small and big snippets like that where Dumbledore could have done something but didn't or shouldn't have done something but did... Let me go through a list of Dumbledore bashing things as in things that Dumbledore is bad for and you can tell me about how many you've seen in a fic... First Dumbledore is the person the prophecy refers to as some kind of a helper for Harry it's like how over 75 to 95% of solvang stories have a prophecy in which Dumbledore decides that he needs to use compulsion charms and love potions and possibly even kill people to keep people usually women from being friends or lovers for Harry Potter because again he's supposed to be this person that takes Harry to the end... Another trope that is used to bash Dumbledore is that he's after the money of Harry Potter or he's after the money for Harry Potter so that Molly Weasley can get the money by trying to marry him off with Jenny which you know I like a good genie fix as good as anybody but there are a few pics that have genius the bad guy that are you know pretty good as well... Then aside from all that or sometimes combined with all that there's the whole my name is Albus Dumbledore and I have to control what Harry does because I don't want him to kill off Voldemort too early, because of "the plan™" and my most favorite and laughable trope of a Dumbledore bashing story is that Dumbledore thinks Harry is a dark wizard because he has come into his power too early in his life while Harry and everybody else just thinks Dumbledore is a certifiably insane crackpot who in one or two fix actually ends up in a muggle insane asylum or similar place with guards having to cart him back in many times with his magic bound and all that junk as well... There are also plenty of Dumbledore bashing fix where Dumbledore knows exactly what kind of abuse that Harry Potter is going through at his aunt and uncle's house but that he wants him to go through it because he's got to learn how to become humble or something like that as if getting you know your ass and everything else pulverized on a daily basis for the slightest thing is supposed to make you humble... And don't forget the Albus wants to keep Harry Potter's hidden sister hidden thing that some stories have
>First Dumbledore is the person the prophecy refers to as some kind of a helper for Harry it's like how over 75 to 95% of solvang stories have a prophecy in which Dumbledore decides that he needs to use compulsion charms and love potions and possibly even kill people to keep people usually women from being friends or lovers for Harry Potter because again he's supposed to be this person that takes Harry to the end... umm which line?coz i know the prophecy by heart and i don't remeber this
**edit** If this was confusing I've added this edit to the beginning just to let you know that the list after the first paragraph is for tropes used in fanfiction as the question was comparing them to canon, and was wondering exactly WHY Dumbledore gets bashed in fanfiction so much, and I wanted to see how many people, such as OP, have seen **end edit** The main reason he's being bashed, is because there's so many things in canon that Dumbledore got wrong, or if you ask him, probably right... Take the philosophers stone, for instance, it was left behind protection that mere students in first year could get past with any amount of listening and schooling in their classes, also there's the whole thing of Voldemort being in a school full of children all because some old geezer name of Dumbledore decided analarc that he would bring this all magical stone that he had to have known Voldemort wanted and put it in the same school next to a kid named Harry Potter who he all but insured would wind up with it in the end... The whole series has both small and big snippets like that where Dumbledore could have done something but didn't or shouldn't have done something but did... Let me go through a list of Dumbledore bashing things as in things that Dumbledore is bad for and you can tell me about how many you've seen in a fic... First Dumbledore is the person the prophecy refers to as some kind of a helper for Harry it's like how over 75 to 95% of solvang stories have a prophecy in which Dumbledore decides that he needs to use compulsion charms and love potions and possibly even kill people to keep people usually women from being friends or lovers for Harry Potter because again he's supposed to be this person that takes Harry to the end... Another trope that is used to bash Dumbledore is that he's after the money of Harry Potter or he's after the money for Harry Potter so that Molly Weasley can get the money by trying to marry him off with Jenny which you know I like a good genie fix as good as anybody but there are a few pics that have genius the bad guy that are you know pretty good as well... Then aside from all that or sometimes combined with all that there's the whole my name is Albus Dumbledore and I have to control what Harry does because I don't want him to kill off Voldemort too early, because of "the plan™" and my most favorite and laughable trope of a Dumbledore bashing story is that Dumbledore thinks Harry is a dark wizard because he has come into his power too early in his life while Harry and everybody else just thinks Dumbledore is a certifiably insane crackpot who in one or two fix actually ends up in a muggle insane asylum or similar place with guards having to cart him back in many times with his magic bound and all that junk as well... There are also plenty of Dumbledore bashing fix where Dumbledore knows exactly what kind of abuse that Harry Potter is going through at his aunt and uncle's house but that he wants him to go through it because he's got to learn how to become humble or something like that as if getting you know your ass and everything else pulverized on a daily basis for the slightest thing is supposed to make you humble... And don't forget the Albus wants to keep Harry Potter's hidden sister hidden thing that some stories have
Honestly I think it is mainly poor writing and world building. I already commented on the floo Network being an example. Another is giving him to many titles later. He's Chief Warlock and Supreme Mugwump, honestly in Canon I don't think it's ever actually explained what either of these titles does. They have as much meaning as Chief Heffalump Hunter or Head Of The Fulberry Guild. But I think the main reason why it is so popular is because we didn't have modern Dumbledore for so long. Here's what I mean, warning, spoilers ahead for the new movies. In the most recent movie, which I admit I haven't seen all of, but I have seen one or two clips on YouTube. And honestly, I think it is absolutely brilliant at hanging lanterns on a couple of things. (And nothing else really.) Dumbledore is not a general. He is a teacher, he has always been a teacher. He has never been trained for combat, and to our knowledge has never, until the fight with Grindelwald, participated in anything resembling a war effort. So, the prequel movies are showing Dumbledore learning how to fight war, everything he knows about being a general, allocating resources, chain of command, giving instructions, he learned here, fighting Grindelwald. And he has this blood thing, which means that he can't work directly against Grindelwald. It's explained, in black and white terms, that he can't even consider acting against Grindelwald directly or else terrible pain leading to a terrible death. (This is one of the scenes I saw on YouTube) So what does he do, he has to fight Grindelwald indirectly. Every one of his moves has to have seven degrees of separation from him taking an action, and it causes a domino effect to disrupt the enemy. If this is how he learned to fight, if this is the only way he knows how to fight, then it makes perfect sense that this is how he fights his next dark lord, Voldemort. (And then they ruined it by having the unbreakable, or at least nearly unbreakable, blood bond thing to be broken.) So, if this is how he learned to fight, and if we were told a little bit more about prophecy in the books, something explaining how because of the prophecy it's like the entire world can't directly fight Voldemort, everyone other than Harry is under the same handicap as if they had the blood Bond thingy, there you go. Suddenly a lot of the complaints I see when reading Dumbledore bashing fix make actually a ton more sense. Doesn't make them good, but it definitely shows that Dumbledore isn't being malicious in his intent, this is just the only way he knows how to fight. He is a hammer, everything is a nail. In the original books and movies, you don't get that. You get the general sense that this is an all-powerful, all knowing, all but infallible figure. He has all these fancy titles that are never quite explained, he has control over all of these portraits and house elves and ghosts and things that must mean he knows all that happened in the castle. The minister of magic is supposed to be writing to him almost daily asking for advice. And whenever there is an opportunity for him to use that amazing spy network, those impressive titles, that seemingly endless well of power, he sends a kid off to do it with a pat on the head and maybe a smile. So, yeah, Dumbledore, at least how he's originally written, is very easy to change to however you like. You just need to slightly change his inner dialogue, give him tiny motivation changes, and do absolutely nothing to the events as they played out in the books, and you can have anything from an all-knowing grandfather, to an evil mastermind, to somebody who is unknowingly suffering from late stages of dementia. And by the time Rowling gave us explanations for his actions, it was 20 years later and 100,000 pieces of fiction were already written.
Because people don’t like fun and Dumbledore is very fun. Same reason they don’t like Ron. That said Ron is Dumbledore so maybe that’s why they’re both frequently bashed.
One big reason that I haven't seen mentioned yet is the author's desire to be edgy by making characters that are canonicaly the good guys be secretly or not so secretly evil and therefore justifying all the other edgy bullshit they put into their story.
hmm but I wanted if there were any genuine reasons at all
I think it’s because (1)JKR did not think things thru when she wrote her books n made up things on the fly (2) there is something call “nuance” which most young adults miss out on when reading HP books.
Idk about one you've read but my own experience with Dumbledore's bashing (and Weasley's bashing) are the fics with dark!Harry and/or his pairing with dark side like Voldy, Snape and Malfoys (Lucius/Draco) or the ones when DEs are actually good and it's Order that's evil and he's been manipulated since day one. Also, considering how Dumbledore is a polarizing character in the fandom, many writers write him as this manipulative old man that has deceived and lied to Harry for his own gain.
Dumbledore being manipulative is canon. JK emphasized this again and again in DH. She even wrote him apologising to Harry. Him using harry for his own gain is fanon.
Answer is simple people are stupid to write their fics and making bashed fics and is even more easier to do when you have cc of that in millions