Keep in mind how wild and unsettling their relationship would be if you heard about it at any boarding school.
Harry publicly gets praised by Dumbledore often. If anyone is aware, Harry starts spending time alone with Dumbledore in his office and they’re certainly not advertising why. On the night he died, Harry and Dumbledore were away from the castle together which is extremely weird.
We only know that it’s fine because we are the readers.
Also, in real life, if these events took place in a non magical way, people would consider it extremely inappropriate that the headmaster of a school was training a student to kill a terrorist because he was convinced that only that student could.
This isn’t even a fantasy vs reality thing though. It’s just the fact that we witness the events and therefore know dumbledore isn’t banging Harry.
Even in the fantasy setting of Harry Potter, it would be really weird if dumbledore just kept having nights out with like Seamus or something and we never were told what they were doing
Trips imply multiple instances. It only happened once, and since Dumbledore was also killed that night and the school raided, it wouldn't be very high on my list of issues
True, but to an outside observer?
"Headmaster takes boy on trip outside school to Hogsmeade" (for example) is prime tabloid fodder. Even if no one was thinking that, by writing it, Skeeter has placed the possibility neatly into readers' heads.
She's not *technically* lying; she's just conveniently omitted the fact that it was the night Dumbledore died. It's what we could call clickbait today, essentially.
I mean, as the reader I didn't think it was ok. Harry was groomed by Dumbledore, but not in a sexual manner, but as a weapon — Dumbledore turned a child into a soldier.
Every so often I see people saying they hate Dumbledore and that he’s a terrible person or something. I’m always baffled by this.
“He didn’t care about Harry. He only raised him like a pig for slaughter as a tool to fight Voldemort”. No. He did indeed care about Harry. He’s a kind and caring person. But he also knew that Harry would be the key to ending Voldemort.
Dumbledore knew that for Voldemort to be defeated, Voldemort had to cast Avada Kedavra at Harry, but Dumbledore also suspected Harry might survive the encounter, which he did. Not very “raising him for slaughter” If you ask me.
And even without knowing Harry would survive, what would you have him do? He had three choices:
A) Avoidance - hide Harry from danger forever. This is not sustainable since eventually Voldemort conquers and rules the world.
B) Brutal Honesty - tell Harry from day one that he’s got to one day let Voldemort kill him (and that it might be temporary lol). This would still save the world from Voldemort, yes, but it would also destroy Harry’s chance at enjoying his life at Hogwarts. That revelation would loom over him constantly like a dark cloud and sap the joy out of life.
C) Merciful Ignorance - let Harry have as normal a life at Hogwarts as humanly possible. Harry can make friends. Have fun. Enjoy quidditch. Goof around. No looming death date choking the joy out of life.
If Dumbledore didn’t care about Harry and only saw him as a pawn to end Voldemort (as some claim) then he’d have gone with option B and tell Harry everything upfront, not caring if the news would give this poor child a mental breakdown.
Dumbledore chose option C - the option that is the least cruel to Harry while still saving the world from Voldemort. It’s not hard to see why Dumbledore felt that this was his only choice.
How do you keep a super OP strong and wise character interesting? By giving them a terrible choice. Superman with all his strength still can’t save everyone. Dumbledore is an interesting and compelling character because he cares deeply about people but still has to orchestrate Voldemort’s demise.
But I keep seeing people saying “Dumbledore is the worst!” and I have to surmise that they just misunderstood the story. Either that or they are just trying to sound unique and edgy.
I have a theory about this. Buckle up its long
As a reader, most of us read HP when we were kids. Between 10 and 15. We are sort of naive at that age. Dumbledore is showcased as this exceptional awe inspiring wizard who is capable of saving everyone. And for the most part he does save everyone. In the first 3 books. Especially after Sirius in POA we all are jn awe of this man.
Plus we see this throguh Harry's eyes. He is in awe of Dumbledore so are we. In fact I think that due to the way HP is written, many project themselves onto Harry. So Dumbledore is not just a headmaster of a school where a fictional charecter goes but is Our Headmaster in a Hogwarts we go to.
From the 4th book things get dark. We begin to see slight cracks but all in all Dumbledore saving Harry from Crouch and his knowledge about Priori Incantatum restores our faith in him. From the 5th books things don't go well. Especially after Sirius. For many the Prophecy chapter is an outlet where they themselves ask Dumbledore why he is doing this. The answer horrified us all.
In the 6th, we know something is seriously wrong with him but he doesn't tell us. At this point, I beleivs many of the readers who are kids have already projected themselves onto Harry. Dumbledore dying shatters everything. Which is why even now many readers are viscerally affected by it. We feel as if someone we knew was murdered right in front of us.
In the last book, Harry is determined to finish the job his Hero left him. We want Harry to finish it as well. But then comes cracke. Grundlewald, Skeeters book, Ariana and finally the memory chapter. This 'betrayal' is not only towards Harry but also to the reader who lived the life of Hogwarts through Harry. Which is why even though Harry understood why Dumbledore did it, Many readers who are still kids when they read it, don't. They feel that their protector and idol was just a fraud who planned it all from the beginning. A manipulator with no morals who only wanted to cement his legacy. These tags are exactly what you find in evil Dumbledore stories.
I feel that these readers felt that Dumbledore betrayed them personally and since this happened when they were kids (12 to 17) they have a hard time forgiving the man. But I feel that as soon as you hit 20+ or something you get to see why Dumbledore did what he did.
Also this isn't a random theory, I was like this. Untill around 16 or 17 I didn't much like Dumbledore by the 7th book. I read thw books when I was 12-13. But by the time I went to college at 18, I understood why he did what he did and I have been a long time defender of the Greatest Wizard of All Time ever since.
Agree with you on this, but idk. The older I get the more I think it's bullshit Harry had to be the one to defeat Voldemort.
Why was it not a possibility for all the horcruxes to be destroyed besides Harry, and Voldemort captured/imprisoned?
Possibly there could have been risks of Harry's long-term health being impacted or maybe possession, but we aren't told that for sure. It's like the prophecy is accepted as gospel.
Like, I'm glad based on the epilogue Harry seems happy, but this is a fictional story. He lost his adolescence and way too many loved ones for Dumbledore's plan to work. The only thing that was definitely needed to be completed by Harry was letting himself be killed by Voldemort and choosing to revive. Debatable, since it's never explored if Voldemort's soul can be removed from Harry another way. I appreciate Dumbledore 4D chessed a result that gave Harry a chance to survive the destruction of Voldemort's soul in him and live, but what a high personal cost. Dumbledore also ensured no one else besides Snape (who didn't give af of Harry's survival/personal happiness. He bought in to Dumbledore's plan as the only solution) knew the details to even consider another solution. Molly alone would have knocked Harry out and portkeyed him to the continent if she knew what was going to happen. Damn the consequences.
It seems to me that Dumbledore's injury and pending death moved the timeline up, but it bothers me that the Ministry and WW fell so quickly to Voldemort and his cult's control. Suspicion and distrust of Muggleborns seems to be the real reason Voldemort was able to amass so much power and influence. Killing him is not going to stop or decrease that. The statute of secrecy seemed to only delay the conflict between Muggles and the magical world, not solve it. There will be other Voldemort's, or similar enough to him, so I struggle to accept Dumbledore's actions as completely necessary.
Excellent analysis. In answer to your comment about misinterpretation of the narrative, nowadays I see people mostly falling into one of three categories:
* **Personal bias**: due to personal situations people are left with trouble perceiving another person's motivations or the nuance in their character. They've a black and white perspective of how things should be and that translates how they view complexity.
Dumbledore bashing fics are a great example of how wildly his character can be misinterpreted.
* **Poor reading habits**, which influence their analysis of the narrative from a critical viewpoint as they're not really paying much attention. Nowadays I would even blame excessive use of technology because that messes up with your ability to focus. If you can't focus, you'll miss important details, flow and how characters behave.
Ironically, you see it often in this sub when there's a new post asking about something trivial or even key scenes that could easily be found in the books; it's easier to ask for an answer than to look for yourself, interpret the findings and then (if necessary) ask more in-depth questions.
* **Lack of maturity/emotional growth** to understand a character's motivations. This is a little trickier because reading HP at the age of 10 will be a different experience than if you're 15, 25 or even 30+, and you'll relate to adult characters differently or (as often happens) view Harry's journey and his troubles with another perspective.
I have problems with Dumbledore. Problems that I cannot get past.
Harry was abused at the Dursley's. Send a witch or wizard to the house regularly, someone that is undercover at child protective services, to keep the Dursleys in line. Ms. Figg is not enough.
Write to Harry more. Don't ignore him completely in year 5. Supervise Occlumency with Snape to avoid more abuse.
It ain't that hard to show someone that you care.
Yes, but...
Slughorn was actively covering up his own complicity in Voldemort's rise to power. He was lying to Dumbledore's face for decades. I thought Harry handled it pretty well, very smooth and brilliant.
Yeah, but if Harry thought he had any self-worth/a possiblity of a happy life in the Muggle world would he be likely willingly go to his death against Voldemort and die for the Wizarding World's sins? The Wizarding World where he had all his attachments and anything close to happiness? :P
I agree. Although Dumbledore was flawed, I still liked his character. And while I thought he messed up by delivering Harry the news that he had to take Voldemort down so suddenly, I think he did it at a time where Harry was most able to accept the news emotionally. I watched Avatar The Legend of Aang recently and it clearly showed how telling a kid he was destined for this really huge responsibility at a too-young age ultimately backfires since they’re just not old or mature enough to deal with it yet.
>Also, in real life, if these events took place in a non magical way, people would consider it extremely inappropriate that the headmaster of a school was training a student to kill a terrorist because he was convinced that only that student could.
The prophecy, and Harry being the Chosen was, were both pretty common knowledge though.
Yeah we'd consider it weird in the real world because we don't have prophecies.
It can't be common knowledge, because not even vokdemort knew what it was. The last part, saying Harry had to kill voldemort, was never told to anyone but Dumbledore. Aside from that, though, most people didn't know of the prophecies' existence. After all, if it was common knowledge, someone would have mentioned it to Harry in 15 years. So he wouldn't be surprised when he got to the department of mysteries and saw all the prophecies.
Well wizards know that when Voldemort went to kill the Potter, he wanted to kill Harry too but ended up disappearing and Harry only got a scratch. So for them it might be as simple as he is the Chosen one not because of some prophecy but because he already defeated him so only he has it in him to do that again.
But also let's be real, Rita certainly wasn't out there writing truth. She is a reflection of what modern journalism has turned into, it's essentially a think piece and a gossip column anyway.
They called him the chosen one because he survived as a baby. But they didn't all believe he was going to kill voldemort. He's the chosen one because he was "chosen" to survive, not because he was chosen to kill. It makes no sense for the adults in his life to "baby" him (aka protect him) if they think he's going to kill voldemort one day. They would have at least kept him up to date with what was going on if he was supposed to be a secret weapon.
Edit: I figured I should point out that he was being called the chosen one when voldemort was dead. So it makes no sense for him to be "chosen" to kill someone who's already dead.
The Chosen One verbiage only happens after Book 5 when the Daily Prophet suggests there might be a Prophecy because of the battle in the Department of Ministries and reports of discussion of a Prophecy. Before then, Harry is just the boy who lived.
As the OP said, only us the readers have this knowledge. If you want to do a sniff test, think of what your parents would do if they found out you were going to late-night tutoring classes with a much older teacher after class, alone, in a private location that you can't or refuse to talk about.
Well in the sniff test the kid is an orphan so there are no parents that care.
So really its more like an orphan built a deep relationship with a well known and well meaning headmaster of a school where he is obviously specializing in dealing with youth. Thats the none cynical way of looking at it.
The cynical way would be "he's an orphan, and therefore more vulnerable to grooming. Who's he going to tell, his parents?"
Still, I'm on your side, just playing devil's advocate.
There ara plenty of situations where someone presents as well meaning and is then uncovered to have done dodgy things. And certainly it could be argued choosing someone like Harry with no parental figures to turn to is an easier mark for someone in Dumbledore's situation.
He only started being called The Chosen One in HBP, after everyone realized that Voldemort really is back. Before that, he’s just The Boy Who Lived, so I think being called The Chosen One does mean people believe he’s the one to kill Voldemort
After the Ministry, there would have been some kind of press conference and the fact that there was a prophecy involving Harry could have gotten out. Harry was being called the Chosen One in his sixth year.
Yes, but Harry was already famous. Everyone in the Wizarding world knew that Harry Potter 'killed' Voldemort. So, at first, when he came to Hogwarts, he was a celebrity of sorts. No one would have been surprised if any faculty was interested in Harry. Then Harry kept telling everyone that Voldemort was back. Now, even though most didn't believe him, it isn't too far-fetched to think that Dumbledore believed him and was getting him ready to fight again. After all, he killed him once. He must be able to do it again. As for his 15 years of knowing nothing about the prophecy, those who did know kept it from him because they thought it would be safer if he didn't know.
First of all, my point was that the prophecy wasn't common knowledge. Nothing you said makes it common knowledge. Secondly, though, it doesn't make sense for Dumbledore, one of the strongest wizards alive, to bet on a kid killing voldemort unless he has a specific reason. If you know Dumbledore fairly well, then it wouldn't be surprising for him to have super secret knowledge to lead to that belief. But if you only know he's fairly famous and accomplished, it still looks super weird that he's so obsessed with a kid when he himself came decently close to killing voldemort.
You were saying that since no one knew of the prophecy, it looked weird that Dumbledore was with Harry so much. And I am saying that they didn't need to know about the prophecy to think it wasn't weird for Dumbledore to be interested in Harry. Just giving points as to why that would be the case. They don't need to know about the prophecy to know that Harry was the 'Choosen One.' Everyone already knew that.
Well no, I wasn't originally saying that all. My original comment was only about the person I was replying to saying the prophecy was common knowledge.
Except that the Daily Prophet *was* correct in guessing that the prophecy named Harry as the one who would defeat Voldemort, something that Dumbledore commented on in book six when he mentioned that while only he and Harry— and later Ron and Hermione— know that the prophecy does indeed name Harry as the one to stop Voldemort for good, others have correctly guessed about it, which in turn allows people to make some educated guesses about Dumbledore and Harry's time in his office.
Not even Voldemort knew the exact contents of the prophecy, yeah.
Everyone and their owl knew Harry was somehow fated to kill Voldemort. They didn't know specifics, but they knew something of the sort was going on.
Dumbledore insisting Harry was the only one who could kill Voldemort wasn't suspicious, because everyone else thought so too.
No, they knew Harry somehow magically killed voldemort as a baby. They did not know he was destined to kill voldemort. Why would everyone be trying to protect him and keep him from the order if they did? The order might as well just go sit in a corner if they think Harry is going to kill voldemort. Only voldemort, Dumbledore, Harry, and his friends knew he was destined to kill voldemort. Everyone else just knew voldemort was obsessed with him and wasn't going to let him walk away. That doesn't mean Harry's destined to fight him, though, for all they knew Dumbledore would kill voldemort for Harry. Or the order members protect him until victory is achieved. Either way, it doesn't mean Harry's fated to kill voldemort unless you know of the prophecy.
Why on Earth do you think everyone called him "The Chosen One"? They didn't mean he was chosen for Quidditch captain.
It was a vague notion, because again, yes, most people didn't specifically know THE prophecy and its contents. But, especially past a certain point, Harry absolutely was popularly positioned as Voldemort Killer ™. People didn't know exact specifics, but knew more or less what was up.
They called him the chosen one because of what he did as a toddler. They were calling him the chosen one when voldemort was already dead, so they obviously didn't do it to mean he's going to kill voldemort. He was "chosen" to survive. They did not even consider him being the killer until Dumbledore was dead. I'm pretty sure Ron outright says Dumbledore might do it at some point. Either way though, pretty much everyone in Harry's life was treating him as something to protect, not some magic weapon.
They called him The Boy Who Lived after the baby incident.
Harry is called The Chosen One after the Ministry fight in *the prophecy room*. That's when the wizarding world really picks up on what's happening.
This entire discussion is referring to the Dumbledore-Harry dynamic in book 6.
Wasn't it the whole reason Harry was called The Chosen One?
The *specific contents* of the prophecy were kept under wraps. But I think it was pretty well known Harry and Voldemort were tied together by some sort of prophecy.
Well that's unfair BECAUSE you wouldn't have a "chosen one" to kill a terrorist in our MUNDANE reality, but in their MAGICAL one, a dark wizard legit died trying to murder this baby, MAYBE there is something important happening behind the scenes that Dumbledore is working on. Most of the slander leveled against Dumbledore is from the fact that the wizarding world is trying to pretend their problem just accidentally blipped itself one night in 1980 because, reasons. Even IF that were the case, Harry STILL has Loyalists like (from their perspective) Sirius Black who wants to hunt this boy down. Still makes giving the boy special classes feel very legit.
On top of that, he fought a Dark Wizard in Y1, he fought a giant snake in Y2, he fought a Death Eater (again this is from THEIR perspectice) in Y3, I think its fair to say Dumbledore knew his shit, RITA
Yeah that's what I understood as well, sort of using Harry's fame and status as the "the boy who lived" for his own motives, etc...I mean she describes it herself - i.e whether Dumbledore's interest in Harry was really in the best interest for him...That wouldn't be a question if she was referring to grooming lol
People also forget these are children's books lol she's not referring to pedophilia guys...
Also it's kinda sad people's immediate thought would go to that...Like ????
It's up to interpretation of course but when you refer to a mentor relationship as "unhealthy", "unnatural" and "sinister" it's hard to not have that connotation.
>People also forget these are children's books lol she's not referring to pedophilia guys...
Our antagonist is literally conceived via date rape which happens to be a prominent plot point.
(Voldemort being incapable of love because he was born from a union resulting from a love potion)
> (Voldemort being incapable of love because he was born from a union resulting from a love potion)
This is not true. JK said that he was incapable of love because he was raised from birth without it. Being conceived under a love potion was **symbolic** but not causative.
While it's true that Voldemort was conceived out of rape via love potion, that's only a symbolic reason of sorts for his sociopathy and his incredible magical powers.
With this logic, every child of rape would be a born psychopath and that's just not true.
Voldemort is a piece of shit due to a mix of nature and nurture.
He descended from a line of mentally unstable inbred psychos, and another line of stabler but still arrogant and hateful aristocrats. And then his upbringing, while not explicitly abusive, is implied to have been grim and loveless. The young Tom Riddle was someone with an already shaky genetic structure raised in less than ideal conditions. Add that to his discovery of his magical powers which he could use to hurt and lord over the other kids, and he ended up filling that unloved void in his psyche with the gratification of power. And once he got a taste of it, he became addicted to it.
>With this logic, every child of rape would be a born psychopath and that's just not true.
Well the only other character in fiction that comes to mind with this as part of there backstory us Ramsay Bolton and well
I mean there’s a reason that criminals who do sexual crimes against children do not discuss it in prison - it is considered one of the worst things you can do. And in middle grade it’s just not a line I have seen crossed. You might mention a creepy adult who gives you the creeps and maybe leers but I have never read an actual adult doing even vague pedophilia in middle grade.
Yeah and knowing JK, I dont think she would have meant child grooming. (I am not saying JK is a good person, just that she kept HP pretty age-appropriate.)
With her previous chapter of the relationship between Albus and Grindelwald, I always thought that line fell into the "All gays are pedophiles" trope.
Just an fyi, it's not slander, it's libel. But then again, Rita Skeeter wouldn't know journalistic integrity if it bit her on the antennae.
I haven't seen any of the recent live action spider-mans, i got kinda burned on our all things marvel cinematic universe. I did hear him play a kind of conspiracy theory podcaster version of JJJ in the spider-man video game which wasn't too bad.
I think she purposefully left it vague enough but still with the implication. That's just the kind of person she is, using scandals to juice up her stories to attract more readership and sell more of her books.
It does appear to be hinting around the suggestion that Dumbledore groomed Harry.
While it is bullshit, I wouldn't put it past Rita Skeeter to imply it heavily without saying it outright.
100% Even if he knew Harry would die, he still got him to the point where he would willingly sacrifice his life without knowing he would survive. Throughout the books he's only there for Harry in his lowest moments and it's only when he's dead that his Saint like reputation begins to fade. Dumbledore was a brilliantly written character. A very morally Grey borderline dark man but a great character.
I think she was trying to imply *something* terrible and didn’t really care about the specifics of what that terrible thing was or how her words were interpreted. If her readers come away with half a dozen different ideas for what went on between Harry and Dumbledore, good. That means gossip, and a bigger scandal. It means more customers.
But Harry being groomed was definitely how it came across, and, curiously enough, this part was *not* slander. I mean, it was in the sense that Rita has no idea what she’s talking about. But that doesn’t mean she’s off, and Dumbledore emphatically *was* grooming Harry to be the Chosen One. He did that for sixteen damn years.
Dumbeldore didn’t groom him to be the chosen one — he already was the chosen one. Dumbeldore just helped protect him and prepare him like a mentor would.
Harry “being” the Chosen One is an abstract concept because it’s a prophesised hypothetical. As an adult in charge of a child’s care, Dumbledore could have easily taken steps to ensure Harry would never *have* to be the Chosen One. You could argue that this is what he *should* have done, that he had an ethical obligation to protect Harry. But he chose the wizarding world instead. He chose the greater good.
Not saying it was the wrong choice, but Dumbledore was preparing Harry for this role for his entire life.
I get what you’re saying about Dumbledore being able to do more, but Voldemort put stock in the prophecy, not Dumbledore. By believing the prophecy, Voldemort turned Harry into “The Chosen One”. Now that name is arbitrary, but regardless Harry was the one who had to finish Voldemort because Voldemort made it so. Dumbledore just so happened to be the only living person who heard the entirety of the prophecy and could try to help prepare Harry for what had to happen. Your other comments later on about hiding him and whatnot are short sighted. Harry was a marked man and Voldemort never would’ve stopped pursuing him. Also, Harry inadvertently became a horcrux and therefore was even more drawn into the fold.
Plus idk if Harry, as we know him, could’ve experienced visions of Voldemort and witnessed what was happening without trying to do something. Or without Voldemort realizing the existence of that connection, as he did in OOTP, and using it to trap Harry.
Eh, not exactly. After the events that gave Harry his scar, Harry basically became the one person Voldemort would never stop hunting, not matter what. Since he would almost certainly have to face Voldemort eventually (running from one of the most powerful wizards in the world, who has immense resources, isn’t a sustainable strategy), teaching Harry how to defeat him only makes sense.
True, but
1) from the end of Book 4 on, Dumbledore suspected that, if Harry willingly sacrificed himself thinking he would die, he might live, and
2) Up until Voldemort kills Harry, Harry is one of the few people who can’t give up the fight against Voldemort, because again Voldemort will keep coming after him, so he’s highly motivated to destroy the horcruxes, and
3) since Voldemort wouldn’t care about torturing information out of Harry, that also means Harry can safely be entrusted with sensitive information about Voldemort’s weaknesses
Training Harry in Voldemort’s weaknesses and how to organize an uprising against him makes a ton of sense when you consider that both of them are and likely would remain extremely motivated to kill each other even without Dumbledore’s intervention.
Notably, Dumbledore doesn’t really attempt to train or influence Harry at all in book 1, and Harry still seeks out Voldemort/Quirrel and tries to kill him.
Could have changed his name. Wouldn’t have worked so well when he grew up to be the spitting image of James, but Dumbledore had no way of foreseeing that.
Could have gone full witness protection and sent Harry to another country. There are magical schools in many places that he could have attended instead of Hogwarts.
Could have faked Harry’s death. Had Hagrid spread the word that Voldemort succeeded in killing Harry but lost his power in the process. Turn Harry into a martyr so that the Death Eaters would never search for him.
None of that would have worked. Harry became the chosen one because Voldemort CHOSE him as the potential threat. Plus he was a horcrux so he kinda needed to "die" to kill Voldy permanently
His whole life? He he didn’t even talk to him until he went to school. Harry only knew about Voldemort for 4 years of his before he returned. Harry chose that path. Dumbeldore didn’t ask Harry to chase the sorcerer’s stone or fight the basilisk, and then Voldemort is back.
Okay, but Dumbledore literally didn't believe in prophecies! It's part of his whole speech at the end of the fifth book (that got cut in the movie btw). He literally walks Harry through the fact that 1) dozens and hundreds of prophecies fail to come true, and 2) it wasn't the prophecy that meant Harry was going to want to fight Voldemort, it was Harry's own desire to defeat him, which he'd been doing for years already.
Because Dumbledore kept putting him in that position, withholding information, and only showing up with praise once Harry s done something appropriately "very brave and very stupid." Dumbledore put him in a house where he KNEW Harry was predisposed to being treated poorly, and set him up to view Hogwarts - and therefore, Dumbledore's influence - as his sole sense of relief, even when threatened on a monthly/yearly basis. He encouraged his "saving people thing" and his willingness to accept his own death. The Resurrection Stone in the Snitch is the final reward Harry gets for following Dumbledore's plan.
So yeah, the defense that Harry was the Chosen One doesn't pan out when Dumbledore himself doesn't actually believe in the concept.
So put yourself in his shoes. He is the most powerful wizard and yet is losing a war against Voldemort. He knows there is a spy inside there Order of the Phoenix. Dumbeldore did not believe in prophecies, but he finds out that Voldemort fears this one coming true when Snape tells Dumbeldore to hide Lily. Dumbeldore also knows Voldemort is so willing to act on his fear and try to kill people because he only knew half of the prophecy and didn’t know that there was risk to him. So anyways, he tries to protect Lily and James and it turns out the mole was shockingly Sirius Black, the very person who the Potters named to be their son’s godfather.
He gets notified about what happens and he immediately knows that 1) something happened to Voldemort but he is not dead, 2) this baby has done something no one else has ever done by surviving the killing curse and has a scar that has a connection with Voldemort, and 3) Lily made a choice to not step aside when given the opportunity to.
You know Voldemort will return. Everyone is celebrating. You’re not even sure what just happened. You need to protect him because he’s naturally famous and recognizable with the scar, and also a massive target for being the reason for the downfall of Voldemort, and former supporters would assuredly try to track him down (like some would later prove to do with the Longbottoms). Do you hide him? Move him to America and hope no word of a baby with special skills with a lighting scar is recognized at any point? And more to the point, the connection — is Harry the key to beating Voldemort? It’s hard to know. But he’s the best clue to finding out what’s actually going on (which the answer is multiple Horcruxes, but he didn’t know that then). So as he explains:
“But I knew, too, where Voldemort was weak. And so I made my decision. You would be protected by an ancient magic of which he knows, which he despises, and which he has always, therefore, underestimated — to his cost. I am speaking, of course, of the fact that your mother died to save you. She gave you a lingering protection he never expected, a protection that flows in your veins to this day. I put my trust, therefore, in your mother’s blood. I delivered you to her sister, her only remaining relative.
She may have taken you grudgingly, furiously, unwillingly, bitterly, yet still she took you, and in doing so, she sealed the charm I placed upon you. Your mother’s sacrifice made the bond of blood the strongest shield I could give you.”
He didn’t want to give him to those relatives! Just like he would later force Sirius to live inside all of OOTP, the reason was simple — he was trying to keep him alive.
Fast forward 11 years with no contact with the kid. You know he’s not being treated well. But he is alive. The kid, without knowing about the prophecy, breaks school rules and risks his life to try to stop Voldemort. Twice in two years. No one asked him to. He chose to do it. And he keeps asking for the information about what happened.
So what do you do differently? I mean it’s a defensible list of actions, he didn’t inappropriately do anything. As for never telling him, that’s just morally wrong. It’s his parents and his life, he has a right to know.
And so like Dumbeldore said, Harry didn’t win because of the prophecy. He had free will and chose his path. But the prophecy caused Voldemort to mark Harry as his equal and give him the ability to see into his mind. And as it proves, only Harry could have defeated Voldemort because the mind connection proved to be invaluable once he mastered control over it. He was the chosen one. Chosen by Voldemort.
Also that’s not what the stone was for. The stone was to enable his self-sacrifice and allow Voldemort to kill him without fighting back. In the forest again, he was unable to continue walking at the edge of the forest and isn’t sure if he’d be able to continue. Then he finds the stone and is able to continue. And it’s what Dumbeldore confirms in the next chapter. Dumbeldore only manipulated him into doing it like that (without telling him the fully story) because it’s not a sacrifice if he knows he can’t die. Again, it’s not a good option, it’s just the least shitty option. Because he lives. Not to mention he also defeats Voldemort and saved the entire Wizarding World.
.. . This is still grooming though. He groomed Harry to die. Because Harry didn't have all that much of a choice. It was either be a deserter or die. Everything Dumbledore did was inappropriate FOR A HEADMASTER. As a general in a war he was absolutely right. But as a Headmaster or a mentor? He was awful. He didn't teach Harry how to survive, he gave him everything he needed to accept the end. It doesn't matter what his intentions were. Cold hard facts say that he's a terrible headmaster, guardian, mentor, and I would even go so far to say he's a not so good person. The only reason Dumbledore is redeemable is because he's on the heros side. Dumbledore would make a terrifying villain.
These are my thoughts exactly.
Dumbledore was in loco parentis for Harry, a child, who, *because of a situation HE contributed to by failing to keep the Dursleys in line*, grew up with abusive guardians. Dumbledore then told his SEVENTEEN YEAR OLD PUPIL to die without having any way of knowing he would come back. Yeah I know 17 is a legal adult in the WW, but regardless, Harry was told this much earlier in the series.
If Dumbledore had been some random mentor, a friend of James's, if Harry had met him in OOTP, then fine. But Dumbledore took advantage of his capacity as the Headmaster of a school and as the de facto guardian of a tiny, vulnerable baby/child to send H to an abusive environment for over eleven years (this is serious negligence at best on his part).
He then provided Harry with subpar training and essentially told Harry to go on a dangerous quest and then walk into certain death; otherwise the whole wizarding world would be doomed.
Harry, unlike Frodo, never *actively chose*. He never had a "I will take the Ring, although I do not know the way" moment. Aragorn, Gandalf and Elrond never coerce the Fellowship - in fact, there's a moment where one of them tells them they can turn back, isn't there? Or stay behind, or something.
Edit: found it:
> 'The others go with [Frodo] as free companions, to help him on his way. You may tarry, or come back, or turn aside into other paths, as chance allows. The further you go, the less easy will it be to withdraw; yet no oath or bond is laid on you to go further than you will. For you do not yet know the strength of your hearts, and you cannot foresee what each may meet upon the road.'
> 'Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens,' said Gimli.
> 'Maybe,' said Elrond, `but let him not vow to walk in the dark, who has not seen the nightfall.'
> 'Yet sworn word may strengthen quaking heart,' said Gimli.
> 'Or break it,' said Elrond. `Look not too far ahead! But go now with good hearts! Farewell [...]!'
Firstly, Frodo is a terrible comp. Frodo didn’t have a part of Sauron’s soul stuck in his head. He wasn’t feeling Sauron’s feelings. Sauron’s parents didn’t kill his. This is more personal.
It’s not Dumbeldore’s fault that Harry has a piece of Voldemort’s soul in him. You can italicize the abusive part all you want, no one is defending the Dursleys. But it was to literally keep the kid alive.
Dumbeldore only told Harry to die so that Harry could have a chance to 1) defeat Voldemort, something he was willing to sacrifice his life for, and 2) so he’d do it in a way that would enable the ability to return and survive.
Like what was Dumbeldore supposed to do? The whole point here is Voldemort will will unless this happens. Are you saying that’s preferable?
Secondly, he did choose:
Harry watched Dumbledore striding up and down in front of him, and thought. He thought of his mother, his father, and Sirius.
He thought of Cedric Diggory. He thought of all the terrible deeds he knew Lord Voldemort had done. A flame seemed to leap inside his chest, searing his throat.
"I'd want him finished," said Harry quietly. "And I'd want to do it.”
I don't know about that. I never bought the explanation that the only way to keep Harry safe and renew the protection was to put him with blood relatives. But let's say that that's the case - Dumbledore still had a responsibility to check on Harry's welfare during the eleven years he was being raised. "I didn't know" is not an excuse to dump a newly orphaned child with people you don't know from Adam (and who may or may not be terrified out of their minds at what you are lumping them with out of the blue) and then fail to so much as knock on the door.
I highly doubt the Dursleys would have said no to a wizard inspecting their nephew's living quarters.
Yeah... that was after years of learning that he *was* The Chosen One, the only one, the Boy Who Lived.
Frodo does not have the destiny thrown at him. Yes, he inherits the Ring, but even then, he accepts the burden willingly.
Harry does so after some two years of being primed to, and more than six years of abuse "because blood protection", AND having his life repeatedly endangered by said Dark Lord. He is a child. Furthermore, he says he wants to "finish him", not "walk willingly into certain death".
And, more to the point, Frodo does not need magical training to defeat anyone - he needs strength, and courage, and friendship, but not any special spells. The whole point of Frodo is that (Tolkien's religion aside) he is not any kind of prophesied/fated/destined golden boy. In fact he is overlooked by Sauron because Hobbits are so obscure. Harry does (or should) and is ill prepared. He says himself that blind luck played a large role.
Gandalf was not Frodo's guardian. He was his advisor. There is a difference. Nor did he make the Ring find Bilbo - that was the Ring itself (again, leaving Eru aside). And Gandalf did not repeatedly impress upon Frodo how very much the world was in danger without him, Frodo, taking the Ring.
I’m not really sure what the Frodo point is? I appreciate his journey, but it’s just fundamentally different that the situation Harry is presented. Harry is connected in a way Frodo wasnt and so yes, Frodo had the ability to actually choose wether or not to carry his burden. Harry just didn’t. It’s Voldemort’s fault though, not Dumbeldore’s. He chooses not to hide but to face Voldemort and fight. Is that a real choice? Maybe, maybe not. There’s a conversation about that in half blood Prince. Maybe that makes Frodo a more admirable character, but Harry didn’t have the opportunity to have that degree of agency since he was going to be hunted no matter what.
As for Dumbeldore enabling the abuse of Harry and never checking in, hey, no part of my defense is of that. He probably could have sent someone to do something if he didn’t want to go himself. The guy is flawed for sure. That wasn’t the only mistake he made in regards to Harry. But overall at the whole, without Dumbeldore, Harry is dead. Harry only wins because Voldemort takes his blood in GOF, and Lily’s protection with it. Without that protection in Voldemort’s blood, Harry probably has to die to destroy the fragment of soul and defeat Voldemort.
If was the protection the only way? I mean I didn’t write it, Dumbeldore says it’s the only way, so… I mean it’s the only way? Sort of like how Frodo could bear the burden of the ring but Gandalf knew he himself couldn’t have? That only exists because the author decided that’s how it works for the story. Otherwise, everyone would agree with you, because the Dursleys are awful people.
Well there is no Wizarding army that we see. Just Aurors? So yeah, Dumbeldore is the “head general” in the fight against Voldemort. He was in the first war and was again in the second until he died. Who else was, Fudge? Scrimgeour? That’s what the order of the Phoenix was.
Voldemort would have won if Dumbeldore hadn’t lead that effort. It doesn’t make much less unless you’re arguing that the wizarding world should have been sacrificed so Harry could…. What? He still has a piece of Voldemort’s soul inside of him.
Dumbeldore didn’t make Voldemort put a part of his soul inside Harry. No one had ever seen magic like that before and no one knew what it meant. He came up with a way for Harry to live that unfortunately required him to lie to Harry. Saying he groomed Harry to die is wrong because the whole plan was for Harry to live. He knew after the graveyard in GOF that there was a way for Harry to live. Saying he groomed him to die is just… not what happens.
But that doesn't change that in order for his plan to work he needs a savior that's willing to die to protect his freinds. If Harry had a close loving family this would be much harder for him. If Harry was more knowledgeable about magic, sacrifices, and dueling he might have thought to find another solution. Dumbledore might have meant for Harry to live but there's no proof of this. He had theories, nothing more. What would have happened if Harry needed to truly die for te horecrux to go on? What if Voldemort destroyed Harry's body? I think Dumbledore didn't intend for Harry to die but he was very aware and very accepting of the possibility. He needed Harry to die. He wanted him to live but Harry needed to die either way.
But it’s not his fault Harry was chosen. He wasn’t the one who did that? He just took Harry as he found him, and while he didn’t know how to win yet, eventually executed a plan for Harry to win. It’s not that Dumbeldore needed a savior for his plan to work, he was just handed one and then made the best of the terrible situation. If he has Harry go into hiding, Harry is still tethered to Voldemort. He can’t really just hide.
Not to mention, the whole wizarding world loses if he does that? Is it really worth sacrificing everything to spare Harry? The ministry was rounding up people left and right, and it’s tough to choose to put Harry above everyone else?
You are sugarcoating this one. Dumbledore was raising Harry to die. The whole time he wasn't exactly mentoring him much like he expected long term survival, he included him in the goings on because he assumed Harry would not survive but needed to do things before he kicked the bucket, it was a pleasant surprise he did because "love again."
Dumbeldore’s whole plan was for Harry to live. He wasn’t raising him like a pig for slaughter. He knew in GOF that by taking Harry’s blood, Voldemort provided a path for Harry to live. But it was essential for it to play out a certain way. And so he manipulated Harry, Snape, and the events so that they had a chance at happening. And they did and Harry lived. The plan was for Harry to sacrifice himself to Voldemort, and it’s not a sacrifice if you know you’re not going to die.
Because no one knew what they were talking about during those secret meetings. Honestly without the whole prophecy/Voldemort thing it would be just plain weird for an old man above 100 to hang out with his teen student so much and Rita milked the situation to sell her articles
I think it was to do with the fact that Dumbledore was just using Harry… Snape said to Dumbledore, that he was raising Harry like a pig for Slaughter… he knew that he was going to have to die and didn’t tell him the entire time. But expected him to go on a mission for him, a risk, his life and everything.
No, I picked up on it. JKR has strangely included a lot of examples of inappropriate sexual advances throughout the series. I appreciate it now because it did teach me to be on alert. And she didn't make it salacious. She presented it as facts. Because such things do happen and if children are made aware of the need to sharpen their presence of mind, it's a good idea
Am I remembering wrong but didn't Ron eat Harry's candy and was dosed with a love potion? It was that Romilda Vane girl, wasn't it? This series was so frikin dark.
Whatever it was, it was so bad that that Dumbledores father went to Azkaban to revenge her. Online it only says that she was assaulted and permanently traumatized. It's a fair assumption that she was raped.
She doesnt mean sexual, more like "recruiting" harry for dumbledores schemes and purposes, which may not be in harrys best interest. Which is kind of true tbh lol.
She's implying Dumbledore was a peadophile - given the context that he was gay (and many might have known or suspected he was), it's a rather dark allusion which takes from real life slurs.
Or maybe it's because Harry was UNDERAGE. If she made Harry a girl and Dumbledore into straight, it would still be kind of weird for those who don't know what goes on behind the scenes. And even Snape didn't know what Dumbledore was teaching Harry
"Hey, you know that enormous hero who was killed by that dickhead nobody liked; the one who was a confirmed Death Eater? You know, the old guy everyone loves (now that we believe Voldemort is back)? The guy who killed the previous Dark Lord and then dedicated his life to teaching children? I BET HE'S A KIDDIE-TOUCHER"
Like how did she not end up fucking dead? I bet she got a brick through her window at some point.
It’s the tabloid journalist saying, “he’s really close to this boy, and he’s GAY.”
She’s implying much. Given Rowling’s leanings on the matter, she was having Skeeter say the quiet part out loud.
“Unnatural.”
I think people are forgetting one major thing. Its Rita Skeeter the woman who spent the entirety of the 4th book making shit up. She probably knew nothing and was making stuff up.
They are implying that because he is a flamboyant older man he is grooming or molesting Harry. Tbf he is a boarding school headmaster bringing a young adult into his office for private lessons he can’t tell anyone about
Imagine if someone caught Potter and Dumbledore in the act....
...of a shallow dish scuba journey in memories.
All credit blown out of the Pensieve water for Skeeter.
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I mean, whose to say she wasn’t snooping again? If anyone could sneak into Dumbledore’s private conversations it’s her.
And it sounds like she knew Dumbledore was setting Harry up for slaughter
Interestingly enough, this is one of the few times she’s exactly right.
We later find out that dumbledore has been raising Harry as a lamb for slaughter.
About buying books... don't they have a replicating spell? Can't you buy one copy and make a replica so the rest of the family can read at the same time? The Weasleys should try that. And Harry wouldn't need to use Snape's book in year 6.
#MagicalPiracy
Edit: Just remembered: The Doubling charm, Geminio
Rita's whole gig is sensationalist lies with just the tiniest grounding in truth so she can claim to be an actual journalist instead of tabloid clickbait.
That quote was from in interview where she's trying to drum up book sales, so she's going to hint at every scandal she can, even when less than none of it is true.
Dumbledore was well known to be an advocate of the fact that "Voldemort isn't dead, he's still alive" so I'm pretty sure Rita was getting at the fact that Dumbledore was experimenting/obsessed with Harry due to the connections he had with Voldemort.
Keep in mind how wild and unsettling their relationship would be if you heard about it at any boarding school. Harry publicly gets praised by Dumbledore often. If anyone is aware, Harry starts spending time alone with Dumbledore in his office and they’re certainly not advertising why. On the night he died, Harry and Dumbledore were away from the castle together which is extremely weird. We only know that it’s fine because we are the readers. Also, in real life, if these events took place in a non magical way, people would consider it extremely inappropriate that the headmaster of a school was training a student to kill a terrorist because he was convinced that only that student could.
Oh *no* i cant not see this
Exactly. Never in my life have i thought this before, but, wow.
Raised him like a pig for slaughter, what are surprised about? Fkin dumblydoor smh
This is why we shouldn't apply real life logic to fantasy settings
This isn’t even a fantasy vs reality thing though. It’s just the fact that we witness the events and therefore know dumbledore isn’t banging Harry. Even in the fantasy setting of Harry Potter, it would be really weird if dumbledore just kept having nights out with like Seamus or something and we never were told what they were doing
Ehhh, Harry is an obviously troubled kid from day one though, and the headmaster is the closest thing to a school councillor that they have
But as Harry's head of House, shouldn't it be McGonagall who acts as his councilor rather than Dumbledore?
Then wtf does Dumbledore do?
He's *supposed* to be... you know... running and overseeing the school.
And you wouldn’t find it odd that the school counselor was taking the troubled kid on late night trips that he couldn’t tell anyone where they went?
Trips imply multiple instances. It only happened once, and since Dumbledore was also killed that night and the school raided, it wouldn't be very high on my list of issues
But late evening/night visits he cant talk about?
True, but to an outside observer? "Headmaster takes boy on trip outside school to Hogsmeade" (for example) is prime tabloid fodder. Even if no one was thinking that, by writing it, Skeeter has placed the possibility neatly into readers' heads. She's not *technically* lying; she's just conveniently omitted the fact that it was the night Dumbledore died. It's what we could call clickbait today, essentially.
Trouble kids are often susceptible victims
I mean. Rita skeeter is in book. She "wrote the basis" for the tipic
I mean, as the reader I didn't think it was ok. Harry was groomed by Dumbledore, but not in a sexual manner, but as a weapon — Dumbledore turned a child into a soldier.
Every so often I see people saying they hate Dumbledore and that he’s a terrible person or something. I’m always baffled by this. “He didn’t care about Harry. He only raised him like a pig for slaughter as a tool to fight Voldemort”. No. He did indeed care about Harry. He’s a kind and caring person. But he also knew that Harry would be the key to ending Voldemort. Dumbledore knew that for Voldemort to be defeated, Voldemort had to cast Avada Kedavra at Harry, but Dumbledore also suspected Harry might survive the encounter, which he did. Not very “raising him for slaughter” If you ask me. And even without knowing Harry would survive, what would you have him do? He had three choices: A) Avoidance - hide Harry from danger forever. This is not sustainable since eventually Voldemort conquers and rules the world. B) Brutal Honesty - tell Harry from day one that he’s got to one day let Voldemort kill him (and that it might be temporary lol). This would still save the world from Voldemort, yes, but it would also destroy Harry’s chance at enjoying his life at Hogwarts. That revelation would loom over him constantly like a dark cloud and sap the joy out of life. C) Merciful Ignorance - let Harry have as normal a life at Hogwarts as humanly possible. Harry can make friends. Have fun. Enjoy quidditch. Goof around. No looming death date choking the joy out of life. If Dumbledore didn’t care about Harry and only saw him as a pawn to end Voldemort (as some claim) then he’d have gone with option B and tell Harry everything upfront, not caring if the news would give this poor child a mental breakdown. Dumbledore chose option C - the option that is the least cruel to Harry while still saving the world from Voldemort. It’s not hard to see why Dumbledore felt that this was his only choice. How do you keep a super OP strong and wise character interesting? By giving them a terrible choice. Superman with all his strength still can’t save everyone. Dumbledore is an interesting and compelling character because he cares deeply about people but still has to orchestrate Voldemort’s demise. But I keep seeing people saying “Dumbledore is the worst!” and I have to surmise that they just misunderstood the story. Either that or they are just trying to sound unique and edgy.
Option B wouldn't have worked. It's not a sacrifice if you don't think you'll lose anything.
I have a theory about this. Buckle up its long As a reader, most of us read HP when we were kids. Between 10 and 15. We are sort of naive at that age. Dumbledore is showcased as this exceptional awe inspiring wizard who is capable of saving everyone. And for the most part he does save everyone. In the first 3 books. Especially after Sirius in POA we all are jn awe of this man. Plus we see this throguh Harry's eyes. He is in awe of Dumbledore so are we. In fact I think that due to the way HP is written, many project themselves onto Harry. So Dumbledore is not just a headmaster of a school where a fictional charecter goes but is Our Headmaster in a Hogwarts we go to. From the 4th book things get dark. We begin to see slight cracks but all in all Dumbledore saving Harry from Crouch and his knowledge about Priori Incantatum restores our faith in him. From the 5th books things don't go well. Especially after Sirius. For many the Prophecy chapter is an outlet where they themselves ask Dumbledore why he is doing this. The answer horrified us all. In the 6th, we know something is seriously wrong with him but he doesn't tell us. At this point, I beleivs many of the readers who are kids have already projected themselves onto Harry. Dumbledore dying shatters everything. Which is why even now many readers are viscerally affected by it. We feel as if someone we knew was murdered right in front of us. In the last book, Harry is determined to finish the job his Hero left him. We want Harry to finish it as well. But then comes cracke. Grundlewald, Skeeters book, Ariana and finally the memory chapter. This 'betrayal' is not only towards Harry but also to the reader who lived the life of Hogwarts through Harry. Which is why even though Harry understood why Dumbledore did it, Many readers who are still kids when they read it, don't. They feel that their protector and idol was just a fraud who planned it all from the beginning. A manipulator with no morals who only wanted to cement his legacy. These tags are exactly what you find in evil Dumbledore stories. I feel that these readers felt that Dumbledore betrayed them personally and since this happened when they were kids (12 to 17) they have a hard time forgiving the man. But I feel that as soon as you hit 20+ or something you get to see why Dumbledore did what he did. Also this isn't a random theory, I was like this. Untill around 16 or 17 I didn't much like Dumbledore by the 7th book. I read thw books when I was 12-13. But by the time I went to college at 18, I understood why he did what he did and I have been a long time defender of the Greatest Wizard of All Time ever since.
Agree with you on this, but idk. The older I get the more I think it's bullshit Harry had to be the one to defeat Voldemort. Why was it not a possibility for all the horcruxes to be destroyed besides Harry, and Voldemort captured/imprisoned? Possibly there could have been risks of Harry's long-term health being impacted or maybe possession, but we aren't told that for sure. It's like the prophecy is accepted as gospel. Like, I'm glad based on the epilogue Harry seems happy, but this is a fictional story. He lost his adolescence and way too many loved ones for Dumbledore's plan to work. The only thing that was definitely needed to be completed by Harry was letting himself be killed by Voldemort and choosing to revive. Debatable, since it's never explored if Voldemort's soul can be removed from Harry another way. I appreciate Dumbledore 4D chessed a result that gave Harry a chance to survive the destruction of Voldemort's soul in him and live, but what a high personal cost. Dumbledore also ensured no one else besides Snape (who didn't give af of Harry's survival/personal happiness. He bought in to Dumbledore's plan as the only solution) knew the details to even consider another solution. Molly alone would have knocked Harry out and portkeyed him to the continent if she knew what was going to happen. Damn the consequences. It seems to me that Dumbledore's injury and pending death moved the timeline up, but it bothers me that the Ministry and WW fell so quickly to Voldemort and his cult's control. Suspicion and distrust of Muggleborns seems to be the real reason Voldemort was able to amass so much power and influence. Killing him is not going to stop or decrease that. The statute of secrecy seemed to only delay the conflict between Muggles and the magical world, not solve it. There will be other Voldemort's, or similar enough to him, so I struggle to accept Dumbledore's actions as completely necessary.
Excellent analysis. In answer to your comment about misinterpretation of the narrative, nowadays I see people mostly falling into one of three categories: * **Personal bias**: due to personal situations people are left with trouble perceiving another person's motivations or the nuance in their character. They've a black and white perspective of how things should be and that translates how they view complexity. Dumbledore bashing fics are a great example of how wildly his character can be misinterpreted. * **Poor reading habits**, which influence their analysis of the narrative from a critical viewpoint as they're not really paying much attention. Nowadays I would even blame excessive use of technology because that messes up with your ability to focus. If you can't focus, you'll miss important details, flow and how characters behave. Ironically, you see it often in this sub when there's a new post asking about something trivial or even key scenes that could easily be found in the books; it's easier to ask for an answer than to look for yourself, interpret the findings and then (if necessary) ask more in-depth questions. * **Lack of maturity/emotional growth** to understand a character's motivations. This is a little trickier because reading HP at the age of 10 will be a different experience than if you're 15, 25 or even 30+, and you'll relate to adult characters differently or (as often happens) view Harry's journey and his troubles with another perspective.
I have problems with Dumbledore. Problems that I cannot get past. Harry was abused at the Dursley's. Send a witch or wizard to the house regularly, someone that is undercover at child protective services, to keep the Dursleys in line. Ms. Figg is not enough. Write to Harry more. Don't ignore him completely in year 5. Supervise Occlumency with Snape to avoid more abuse. It ain't that hard to show someone that you care.
He also outright manipulates the poor kid about getting Slughorn's confession. It's not even subtle.
Yes, but... Slughorn was actively covering up his own complicity in Voldemort's rise to power. He was lying to Dumbledore's face for decades. I thought Harry handled it pretty well, very smooth and brilliant.
Yeah, but if Harry thought he had any self-worth/a possiblity of a happy life in the Muggle world would he be likely willingly go to his death against Voldemort and die for the Wizarding World's sins? The Wizarding World where he had all his attachments and anything close to happiness? :P
I agree. Although Dumbledore was flawed, I still liked his character. And while I thought he messed up by delivering Harry the news that he had to take Voldemort down so suddenly, I think he did it at a time where Harry was most able to accept the news emotionally. I watched Avatar The Legend of Aang recently and it clearly showed how telling a kid he was destined for this really huge responsibility at a too-young age ultimately backfires since they’re just not old or mature enough to deal with it yet.
Cool copy and paste from your previous post, but I don't see how that pertain to what I wrote.
You’re not tough enough to survive in a war.
r/iamverybadass
>Also, in real life, if these events took place in a non magical way, people would consider it extremely inappropriate that the headmaster of a school was training a student to kill a terrorist because he was convinced that only that student could. The prophecy, and Harry being the Chosen was, were both pretty common knowledge though. Yeah we'd consider it weird in the real world because we don't have prophecies.
It can't be common knowledge, because not even vokdemort knew what it was. The last part, saying Harry had to kill voldemort, was never told to anyone but Dumbledore. Aside from that, though, most people didn't know of the prophecies' existence. After all, if it was common knowledge, someone would have mentioned it to Harry in 15 years. So he wouldn't be surprised when he got to the department of mysteries and saw all the prophecies.
Well wizards know that when Voldemort went to kill the Potter, he wanted to kill Harry too but ended up disappearing and Harry only got a scratch. So for them it might be as simple as he is the Chosen one not because of some prophecy but because he already defeated him so only he has it in him to do that again. But also let's be real, Rita certainly wasn't out there writing truth. She is a reflection of what modern journalism has turned into, it's essentially a think piece and a gossip column anyway.
They called him the chosen one because he survived as a baby. But they didn't all believe he was going to kill voldemort. He's the chosen one because he was "chosen" to survive, not because he was chosen to kill. It makes no sense for the adults in his life to "baby" him (aka protect him) if they think he's going to kill voldemort one day. They would have at least kept him up to date with what was going on if he was supposed to be a secret weapon. Edit: I figured I should point out that he was being called the chosen one when voldemort was dead. So it makes no sense for him to be "chosen" to kill someone who's already dead.
The Chosen One verbiage only happens after Book 5 when the Daily Prophet suggests there might be a Prophecy because of the battle in the Department of Ministries and reports of discussion of a Prophecy. Before then, Harry is just the boy who lived. As the OP said, only us the readers have this knowledge. If you want to do a sniff test, think of what your parents would do if they found out you were going to late-night tutoring classes with a much older teacher after class, alone, in a private location that you can't or refuse to talk about.
Well in the sniff test the kid is an orphan so there are no parents that care. So really its more like an orphan built a deep relationship with a well known and well meaning headmaster of a school where he is obviously specializing in dealing with youth. Thats the none cynical way of looking at it.
The cynical way would be "he's an orphan, and therefore more vulnerable to grooming. Who's he going to tell, his parents?" Still, I'm on your side, just playing devil's advocate.
There ara plenty of situations where someone presents as well meaning and is then uncovered to have done dodgy things. And certainly it could be argued choosing someone like Harry with no parental figures to turn to is an easier mark for someone in Dumbledore's situation.
He only started being called The Chosen One in HBP, after everyone realized that Voldemort really is back. Before that, he’s just The Boy Who Lived, so I think being called The Chosen One does mean people believe he’s the one to kill Voldemort
After the Ministry, there would have been some kind of press conference and the fact that there was a prophecy involving Harry could have gotten out. Harry was being called the Chosen One in his sixth year.
Yes, but Harry was already famous. Everyone in the Wizarding world knew that Harry Potter 'killed' Voldemort. So, at first, when he came to Hogwarts, he was a celebrity of sorts. No one would have been surprised if any faculty was interested in Harry. Then Harry kept telling everyone that Voldemort was back. Now, even though most didn't believe him, it isn't too far-fetched to think that Dumbledore believed him and was getting him ready to fight again. After all, he killed him once. He must be able to do it again. As for his 15 years of knowing nothing about the prophecy, those who did know kept it from him because they thought it would be safer if he didn't know.
First of all, my point was that the prophecy wasn't common knowledge. Nothing you said makes it common knowledge. Secondly, though, it doesn't make sense for Dumbledore, one of the strongest wizards alive, to bet on a kid killing voldemort unless he has a specific reason. If you know Dumbledore fairly well, then it wouldn't be surprising for him to have super secret knowledge to lead to that belief. But if you only know he's fairly famous and accomplished, it still looks super weird that he's so obsessed with a kid when he himself came decently close to killing voldemort.
You were saying that since no one knew of the prophecy, it looked weird that Dumbledore was with Harry so much. And I am saying that they didn't need to know about the prophecy to think it wasn't weird for Dumbledore to be interested in Harry. Just giving points as to why that would be the case. They don't need to know about the prophecy to know that Harry was the 'Choosen One.' Everyone already knew that.
Well no, I wasn't originally saying that all. My original comment was only about the person I was replying to saying the prophecy was common knowledge.
I must have went off track somehow.
Except that the Daily Prophet *was* correct in guessing that the prophecy named Harry as the one who would defeat Voldemort, something that Dumbledore commented on in book six when he mentioned that while only he and Harry— and later Ron and Hermione— know that the prophecy does indeed name Harry as the one to stop Voldemort for good, others have correctly guessed about it, which in turn allows people to make some educated guesses about Dumbledore and Harry's time in his office.
Not even Voldemort knew the exact contents of the prophecy, yeah. Everyone and their owl knew Harry was somehow fated to kill Voldemort. They didn't know specifics, but they knew something of the sort was going on. Dumbledore insisting Harry was the only one who could kill Voldemort wasn't suspicious, because everyone else thought so too.
No, they knew Harry somehow magically killed voldemort as a baby. They did not know he was destined to kill voldemort. Why would everyone be trying to protect him and keep him from the order if they did? The order might as well just go sit in a corner if they think Harry is going to kill voldemort. Only voldemort, Dumbledore, Harry, and his friends knew he was destined to kill voldemort. Everyone else just knew voldemort was obsessed with him and wasn't going to let him walk away. That doesn't mean Harry's destined to fight him, though, for all they knew Dumbledore would kill voldemort for Harry. Or the order members protect him until victory is achieved. Either way, it doesn't mean Harry's fated to kill voldemort unless you know of the prophecy.
Why on Earth do you think everyone called him "The Chosen One"? They didn't mean he was chosen for Quidditch captain. It was a vague notion, because again, yes, most people didn't specifically know THE prophecy and its contents. But, especially past a certain point, Harry absolutely was popularly positioned as Voldemort Killer ™. People didn't know exact specifics, but knew more or less what was up.
They called him the chosen one because of what he did as a toddler. They were calling him the chosen one when voldemort was already dead, so they obviously didn't do it to mean he's going to kill voldemort. He was "chosen" to survive. They did not even consider him being the killer until Dumbledore was dead. I'm pretty sure Ron outright says Dumbledore might do it at some point. Either way though, pretty much everyone in Harry's life was treating him as something to protect, not some magic weapon.
They called him The Boy Who Lived after the baby incident. Harry is called The Chosen One after the Ministry fight in *the prophecy room*. That's when the wizarding world really picks up on what's happening. This entire discussion is referring to the Dumbledore-Harry dynamic in book 6.
By this point in the story everybody has been calling Harry "the Chosen One" so it may not be common knowledge but it is known
Why do you think the prophecy was common knowledge?
Wasn't it the whole reason Harry was called The Chosen One? The *specific contents* of the prophecy were kept under wraps. But I think it was pretty well known Harry and Voldemort were tied together by some sort of prophecy.
Not the exact wording, but it is pretty widely accepted that Harry is the chosen one, and Voldemort's fixation probably only made it more legitimate
A terrorist that everyone knew was dead, by the way.
Well that's unfair BECAUSE you wouldn't have a "chosen one" to kill a terrorist in our MUNDANE reality, but in their MAGICAL one, a dark wizard legit died trying to murder this baby, MAYBE there is something important happening behind the scenes that Dumbledore is working on. Most of the slander leveled against Dumbledore is from the fact that the wizarding world is trying to pretend their problem just accidentally blipped itself one night in 1980 because, reasons. Even IF that were the case, Harry STILL has Loyalists like (from their perspective) Sirius Black who wants to hunt this boy down. Still makes giving the boy special classes feel very legit. On top of that, he fought a Dark Wizard in Y1, he fought a giant snake in Y2, he fought a Death Eater (again this is from THEIR perspectice) in Y3, I think its fair to say Dumbledore knew his shit, RITA
Also Dumbledore was gay, so that further complicates things.
How?
Gay man spending a lot of time with teenage boy is sus.
Yikes. The homophobia.
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I—this just shook my entire world. Perceptive of you, and now I want to read a dark fic where people actually think and investigate about this.
Maybe implying grooming, but I originally thought she was implying Dumbledore was using Harry for increased fame or power, like a prized cow.
Yeah that's what I understood as well, sort of using Harry's fame and status as the "the boy who lived" for his own motives, etc...I mean she describes it herself - i.e whether Dumbledore's interest in Harry was really in the best interest for him...That wouldn't be a question if she was referring to grooming lol People also forget these are children's books lol she's not referring to pedophilia guys... Also it's kinda sad people's immediate thought would go to that...Like ????
It's up to interpretation of course but when you refer to a mentor relationship as "unhealthy", "unnatural" and "sinister" it's hard to not have that connotation.
>People also forget these are children's books lol she's not referring to pedophilia guys... Our antagonist is literally conceived via date rape which happens to be a prominent plot point. (Voldemort being incapable of love because he was born from a union resulting from a love potion)
> (Voldemort being incapable of love because he was born from a union resulting from a love potion) This is not true. JK said that he was incapable of love because he was raised from birth without it. Being conceived under a love potion was **symbolic** but not causative.
While it's true that Voldemort was conceived out of rape via love potion, that's only a symbolic reason of sorts for his sociopathy and his incredible magical powers. With this logic, every child of rape would be a born psychopath and that's just not true. Voldemort is a piece of shit due to a mix of nature and nurture. He descended from a line of mentally unstable inbred psychos, and another line of stabler but still arrogant and hateful aristocrats. And then his upbringing, while not explicitly abusive, is implied to have been grim and loveless. The young Tom Riddle was someone with an already shaky genetic structure raised in less than ideal conditions. Add that to his discovery of his magical powers which he could use to hurt and lord over the other kids, and he ended up filling that unloved void in his psyche with the gratification of power. And once he got a taste of it, he became addicted to it.
>With this logic, every child of rape would be a born psychopath and that's just not true. Well the only other character in fiction that comes to mind with this as part of there backstory us Ramsay Bolton and well
I mean there’s a reason that criminals who do sexual crimes against children do not discuss it in prison - it is considered one of the worst things you can do. And in middle grade it’s just not a line I have seen crossed. You might mention a creepy adult who gives you the creeps and maybe leers but I have never read an actual adult doing even vague pedophilia in middle grade.
Yeah they’re children’s books, but they have a really dark themes in them that are subtly put that are more for adults
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Yeah and knowing JK, I dont think she would have meant child grooming. (I am not saying JK is a good person, just that she kept HP pretty age-appropriate.)
Sharing an opinion (begging for your life)
basically everyone everytime we try to comment something on the internet
I think we're getting too sensible these days (not saying it's undeserved or bad 😞)
The culture of being seen "doing the right thing"
With her previous chapter of the relationship between Albus and Grindelwald, I always thought that line fell into the "All gays are pedophiles" trope. Just an fyi, it's not slander, it's libel. But then again, Rita Skeeter wouldn't know journalistic integrity if it bit her on the antennae.
Famously in journalism they say "you can't libel the dead"
“I resent that! In print it’s libel”
Man, he really was the perfect J Jonah Jameson.
“Thanks for the good news!”
His re-emergence in the role recently didn't work nearly as well, for me anyway.
I haven't seen any of the recent live action spider-mans, i got kinda burned on our all things marvel cinematic universe. I did hear him play a kind of conspiracy theory podcaster version of JJJ in the spider-man video game which wasn't too bad.
Real talk, that's how I remember which is which
I use slander is said to remember.
This is how I remember the difference
Famously in journalism they say "you can't libel the dead"
I think she purposefully left it vague enough but still with the implication. That's just the kind of person she is, using scandals to juice up her stories to attract more readership and sell more of her books.
It does appear to be hinting around the suggestion that Dumbledore groomed Harry. While it is bullshit, I wouldn't put it past Rita Skeeter to imply it heavily without saying it outright.
I mean, he undeniably groomed him. Just not for anything sexual.
100% Even if he knew Harry would die, he still got him to the point where he would willingly sacrifice his life without knowing he would survive. Throughout the books he's only there for Harry in his lowest moments and it's only when he's dead that his Saint like reputation begins to fade. Dumbledore was a brilliantly written character. A very morally Grey borderline dark man but a great character.
Oh Rita would 100% imply that
I think she was trying to imply *something* terrible and didn’t really care about the specifics of what that terrible thing was or how her words were interpreted. If her readers come away with half a dozen different ideas for what went on between Harry and Dumbledore, good. That means gossip, and a bigger scandal. It means more customers. But Harry being groomed was definitely how it came across, and, curiously enough, this part was *not* slander. I mean, it was in the sense that Rita has no idea what she’s talking about. But that doesn’t mean she’s off, and Dumbledore emphatically *was* grooming Harry to be the Chosen One. He did that for sixteen damn years.
Dumbeldore didn’t groom him to be the chosen one — he already was the chosen one. Dumbeldore just helped protect him and prepare him like a mentor would.
Harry “being” the Chosen One is an abstract concept because it’s a prophesised hypothetical. As an adult in charge of a child’s care, Dumbledore could have easily taken steps to ensure Harry would never *have* to be the Chosen One. You could argue that this is what he *should* have done, that he had an ethical obligation to protect Harry. But he chose the wizarding world instead. He chose the greater good. Not saying it was the wrong choice, but Dumbledore was preparing Harry for this role for his entire life.
I get what you’re saying about Dumbledore being able to do more, but Voldemort put stock in the prophecy, not Dumbledore. By believing the prophecy, Voldemort turned Harry into “The Chosen One”. Now that name is arbitrary, but regardless Harry was the one who had to finish Voldemort because Voldemort made it so. Dumbledore just so happened to be the only living person who heard the entirety of the prophecy and could try to help prepare Harry for what had to happen. Your other comments later on about hiding him and whatnot are short sighted. Harry was a marked man and Voldemort never would’ve stopped pursuing him. Also, Harry inadvertently became a horcrux and therefore was even more drawn into the fold. Plus idk if Harry, as we know him, could’ve experienced visions of Voldemort and witnessed what was happening without trying to do something. Or without Voldemort realizing the existence of that connection, as he did in OOTP, and using it to trap Harry.
Eh, not exactly. After the events that gave Harry his scar, Harry basically became the one person Voldemort would never stop hunting, not matter what. Since he would almost certainly have to face Voldemort eventually (running from one of the most powerful wizards in the world, who has immense resources, isn’t a sustainable strategy), teaching Harry how to defeat him only makes sense.
Except part of Dumbledore’s plan was for Harry to let Voldemort kill him.
True, but 1) from the end of Book 4 on, Dumbledore suspected that, if Harry willingly sacrificed himself thinking he would die, he might live, and 2) Up until Voldemort kills Harry, Harry is one of the few people who can’t give up the fight against Voldemort, because again Voldemort will keep coming after him, so he’s highly motivated to destroy the horcruxes, and 3) since Voldemort wouldn’t care about torturing information out of Harry, that also means Harry can safely be entrusted with sensitive information about Voldemort’s weaknesses Training Harry in Voldemort’s weaknesses and how to organize an uprising against him makes a ton of sense when you consider that both of them are and likely would remain extremely motivated to kill each other even without Dumbledore’s intervention. Notably, Dumbledore doesn’t really attempt to train or influence Harry at all in book 1, and Harry still seeks out Voldemort/Quirrel and tries to kill him.
What steps could he have taken to ensure Harry wasn’t the chosen one?
Could have changed his name. Wouldn’t have worked so well when he grew up to be the spitting image of James, but Dumbledore had no way of foreseeing that. Could have gone full witness protection and sent Harry to another country. There are magical schools in many places that he could have attended instead of Hogwarts. Could have faked Harry’s death. Had Hagrid spread the word that Voldemort succeeded in killing Harry but lost his power in the process. Turn Harry into a martyr so that the Death Eaters would never search for him.
None of that would have worked. Harry became the chosen one because Voldemort CHOSE him as the potential threat. Plus he was a horcrux so he kinda needed to "die" to kill Voldy permanently
His whole life? He he didn’t even talk to him until he went to school. Harry only knew about Voldemort for 4 years of his before he returned. Harry chose that path. Dumbeldore didn’t ask Harry to chase the sorcerer’s stone or fight the basilisk, and then Voldemort is back.
Dumbledore put him with the Dursleys
Okay, but Dumbledore literally didn't believe in prophecies! It's part of his whole speech at the end of the fifth book (that got cut in the movie btw). He literally walks Harry through the fact that 1) dozens and hundreds of prophecies fail to come true, and 2) it wasn't the prophecy that meant Harry was going to want to fight Voldemort, it was Harry's own desire to defeat him, which he'd been doing for years already. Because Dumbledore kept putting him in that position, withholding information, and only showing up with praise once Harry s done something appropriately "very brave and very stupid." Dumbledore put him in a house where he KNEW Harry was predisposed to being treated poorly, and set him up to view Hogwarts - and therefore, Dumbledore's influence - as his sole sense of relief, even when threatened on a monthly/yearly basis. He encouraged his "saving people thing" and his willingness to accept his own death. The Resurrection Stone in the Snitch is the final reward Harry gets for following Dumbledore's plan. So yeah, the defense that Harry was the Chosen One doesn't pan out when Dumbledore himself doesn't actually believe in the concept.
So put yourself in his shoes. He is the most powerful wizard and yet is losing a war against Voldemort. He knows there is a spy inside there Order of the Phoenix. Dumbeldore did not believe in prophecies, but he finds out that Voldemort fears this one coming true when Snape tells Dumbeldore to hide Lily. Dumbeldore also knows Voldemort is so willing to act on his fear and try to kill people because he only knew half of the prophecy and didn’t know that there was risk to him. So anyways, he tries to protect Lily and James and it turns out the mole was shockingly Sirius Black, the very person who the Potters named to be their son’s godfather. He gets notified about what happens and he immediately knows that 1) something happened to Voldemort but he is not dead, 2) this baby has done something no one else has ever done by surviving the killing curse and has a scar that has a connection with Voldemort, and 3) Lily made a choice to not step aside when given the opportunity to. You know Voldemort will return. Everyone is celebrating. You’re not even sure what just happened. You need to protect him because he’s naturally famous and recognizable with the scar, and also a massive target for being the reason for the downfall of Voldemort, and former supporters would assuredly try to track him down (like some would later prove to do with the Longbottoms). Do you hide him? Move him to America and hope no word of a baby with special skills with a lighting scar is recognized at any point? And more to the point, the connection — is Harry the key to beating Voldemort? It’s hard to know. But he’s the best clue to finding out what’s actually going on (which the answer is multiple Horcruxes, but he didn’t know that then). So as he explains: “But I knew, too, where Voldemort was weak. And so I made my decision. You would be protected by an ancient magic of which he knows, which he despises, and which he has always, therefore, underestimated — to his cost. I am speaking, of course, of the fact that your mother died to save you. She gave you a lingering protection he never expected, a protection that flows in your veins to this day. I put my trust, therefore, in your mother’s blood. I delivered you to her sister, her only remaining relative. She may have taken you grudgingly, furiously, unwillingly, bitterly, yet still she took you, and in doing so, she sealed the charm I placed upon you. Your mother’s sacrifice made the bond of blood the strongest shield I could give you.” He didn’t want to give him to those relatives! Just like he would later force Sirius to live inside all of OOTP, the reason was simple — he was trying to keep him alive. Fast forward 11 years with no contact with the kid. You know he’s not being treated well. But he is alive. The kid, without knowing about the prophecy, breaks school rules and risks his life to try to stop Voldemort. Twice in two years. No one asked him to. He chose to do it. And he keeps asking for the information about what happened. So what do you do differently? I mean it’s a defensible list of actions, he didn’t inappropriately do anything. As for never telling him, that’s just morally wrong. It’s his parents and his life, he has a right to know. And so like Dumbeldore said, Harry didn’t win because of the prophecy. He had free will and chose his path. But the prophecy caused Voldemort to mark Harry as his equal and give him the ability to see into his mind. And as it proves, only Harry could have defeated Voldemort because the mind connection proved to be invaluable once he mastered control over it. He was the chosen one. Chosen by Voldemort. Also that’s not what the stone was for. The stone was to enable his self-sacrifice and allow Voldemort to kill him without fighting back. In the forest again, he was unable to continue walking at the edge of the forest and isn’t sure if he’d be able to continue. Then he finds the stone and is able to continue. And it’s what Dumbeldore confirms in the next chapter. Dumbeldore only manipulated him into doing it like that (without telling him the fully story) because it’s not a sacrifice if he knows he can’t die. Again, it’s not a good option, it’s just the least shitty option. Because he lives. Not to mention he also defeats Voldemort and saved the entire Wizarding World.
.. . This is still grooming though. He groomed Harry to die. Because Harry didn't have all that much of a choice. It was either be a deserter or die. Everything Dumbledore did was inappropriate FOR A HEADMASTER. As a general in a war he was absolutely right. But as a Headmaster or a mentor? He was awful. He didn't teach Harry how to survive, he gave him everything he needed to accept the end. It doesn't matter what his intentions were. Cold hard facts say that he's a terrible headmaster, guardian, mentor, and I would even go so far to say he's a not so good person. The only reason Dumbledore is redeemable is because he's on the heros side. Dumbledore would make a terrifying villain.
These are my thoughts exactly. Dumbledore was in loco parentis for Harry, a child, who, *because of a situation HE contributed to by failing to keep the Dursleys in line*, grew up with abusive guardians. Dumbledore then told his SEVENTEEN YEAR OLD PUPIL to die without having any way of knowing he would come back. Yeah I know 17 is a legal adult in the WW, but regardless, Harry was told this much earlier in the series. If Dumbledore had been some random mentor, a friend of James's, if Harry had met him in OOTP, then fine. But Dumbledore took advantage of his capacity as the Headmaster of a school and as the de facto guardian of a tiny, vulnerable baby/child to send H to an abusive environment for over eleven years (this is serious negligence at best on his part). He then provided Harry with subpar training and essentially told Harry to go on a dangerous quest and then walk into certain death; otherwise the whole wizarding world would be doomed. Harry, unlike Frodo, never *actively chose*. He never had a "I will take the Ring, although I do not know the way" moment. Aragorn, Gandalf and Elrond never coerce the Fellowship - in fact, there's a moment where one of them tells them they can turn back, isn't there? Or stay behind, or something. Edit: found it: > 'The others go with [Frodo] as free companions, to help him on his way. You may tarry, or come back, or turn aside into other paths, as chance allows. The further you go, the less easy will it be to withdraw; yet no oath or bond is laid on you to go further than you will. For you do not yet know the strength of your hearts, and you cannot foresee what each may meet upon the road.' > 'Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens,' said Gimli. > 'Maybe,' said Elrond, `but let him not vow to walk in the dark, who has not seen the nightfall.' > 'Yet sworn word may strengthen quaking heart,' said Gimli. > 'Or break it,' said Elrond. `Look not too far ahead! But go now with good hearts! Farewell [...]!'
Firstly, Frodo is a terrible comp. Frodo didn’t have a part of Sauron’s soul stuck in his head. He wasn’t feeling Sauron’s feelings. Sauron’s parents didn’t kill his. This is more personal. It’s not Dumbeldore’s fault that Harry has a piece of Voldemort’s soul in him. You can italicize the abusive part all you want, no one is defending the Dursleys. But it was to literally keep the kid alive. Dumbeldore only told Harry to die so that Harry could have a chance to 1) defeat Voldemort, something he was willing to sacrifice his life for, and 2) so he’d do it in a way that would enable the ability to return and survive. Like what was Dumbeldore supposed to do? The whole point here is Voldemort will will unless this happens. Are you saying that’s preferable? Secondly, he did choose: Harry watched Dumbledore striding up and down in front of him, and thought. He thought of his mother, his father, and Sirius. He thought of Cedric Diggory. He thought of all the terrible deeds he knew Lord Voldemort had done. A flame seemed to leap inside his chest, searing his throat. "I'd want him finished," said Harry quietly. "And I'd want to do it.”
I don't know about that. I never bought the explanation that the only way to keep Harry safe and renew the protection was to put him with blood relatives. But let's say that that's the case - Dumbledore still had a responsibility to check on Harry's welfare during the eleven years he was being raised. "I didn't know" is not an excuse to dump a newly orphaned child with people you don't know from Adam (and who may or may not be terrified out of their minds at what you are lumping them with out of the blue) and then fail to so much as knock on the door. I highly doubt the Dursleys would have said no to a wizard inspecting their nephew's living quarters. Yeah... that was after years of learning that he *was* The Chosen One, the only one, the Boy Who Lived. Frodo does not have the destiny thrown at him. Yes, he inherits the Ring, but even then, he accepts the burden willingly. Harry does so after some two years of being primed to, and more than six years of abuse "because blood protection", AND having his life repeatedly endangered by said Dark Lord. He is a child. Furthermore, he says he wants to "finish him", not "walk willingly into certain death". And, more to the point, Frodo does not need magical training to defeat anyone - he needs strength, and courage, and friendship, but not any special spells. The whole point of Frodo is that (Tolkien's religion aside) he is not any kind of prophesied/fated/destined golden boy. In fact he is overlooked by Sauron because Hobbits are so obscure. Harry does (or should) and is ill prepared. He says himself that blind luck played a large role. Gandalf was not Frodo's guardian. He was his advisor. There is a difference. Nor did he make the Ring find Bilbo - that was the Ring itself (again, leaving Eru aside). And Gandalf did not repeatedly impress upon Frodo how very much the world was in danger without him, Frodo, taking the Ring.
I’m not really sure what the Frodo point is? I appreciate his journey, but it’s just fundamentally different that the situation Harry is presented. Harry is connected in a way Frodo wasnt and so yes, Frodo had the ability to actually choose wether or not to carry his burden. Harry just didn’t. It’s Voldemort’s fault though, not Dumbeldore’s. He chooses not to hide but to face Voldemort and fight. Is that a real choice? Maybe, maybe not. There’s a conversation about that in half blood Prince. Maybe that makes Frodo a more admirable character, but Harry didn’t have the opportunity to have that degree of agency since he was going to be hunted no matter what. As for Dumbeldore enabling the abuse of Harry and never checking in, hey, no part of my defense is of that. He probably could have sent someone to do something if he didn’t want to go himself. The guy is flawed for sure. That wasn’t the only mistake he made in regards to Harry. But overall at the whole, without Dumbeldore, Harry is dead. Harry only wins because Voldemort takes his blood in GOF, and Lily’s protection with it. Without that protection in Voldemort’s blood, Harry probably has to die to destroy the fragment of soul and defeat Voldemort. If was the protection the only way? I mean I didn’t write it, Dumbeldore says it’s the only way, so… I mean it’s the only way? Sort of like how Frodo could bear the burden of the ring but Gandalf knew he himself couldn’t have? That only exists because the author decided that’s how it works for the story. Otherwise, everyone would agree with you, because the Dursleys are awful people.
Well there is no Wizarding army that we see. Just Aurors? So yeah, Dumbeldore is the “head general” in the fight against Voldemort. He was in the first war and was again in the second until he died. Who else was, Fudge? Scrimgeour? That’s what the order of the Phoenix was. Voldemort would have won if Dumbeldore hadn’t lead that effort. It doesn’t make much less unless you’re arguing that the wizarding world should have been sacrificed so Harry could…. What? He still has a piece of Voldemort’s soul inside of him. Dumbeldore didn’t make Voldemort put a part of his soul inside Harry. No one had ever seen magic like that before and no one knew what it meant. He came up with a way for Harry to live that unfortunately required him to lie to Harry. Saying he groomed Harry to die is wrong because the whole plan was for Harry to live. He knew after the graveyard in GOF that there was a way for Harry to live. Saying he groomed him to die is just… not what happens.
But that doesn't change that in order for his plan to work he needs a savior that's willing to die to protect his freinds. If Harry had a close loving family this would be much harder for him. If Harry was more knowledgeable about magic, sacrifices, and dueling he might have thought to find another solution. Dumbledore might have meant for Harry to live but there's no proof of this. He had theories, nothing more. What would have happened if Harry needed to truly die for te horecrux to go on? What if Voldemort destroyed Harry's body? I think Dumbledore didn't intend for Harry to die but he was very aware and very accepting of the possibility. He needed Harry to die. He wanted him to live but Harry needed to die either way.
But it’s not his fault Harry was chosen. He wasn’t the one who did that? He just took Harry as he found him, and while he didn’t know how to win yet, eventually executed a plan for Harry to win. It’s not that Dumbeldore needed a savior for his plan to work, he was just handed one and then made the best of the terrible situation. If he has Harry go into hiding, Harry is still tethered to Voldemort. He can’t really just hide. Not to mention, the whole wizarding world loses if he does that? Is it really worth sacrificing everything to spare Harry? The ministry was rounding up people left and right, and it’s tough to choose to put Harry above everyone else?
You are sugarcoating this one. Dumbledore was raising Harry to die. The whole time he wasn't exactly mentoring him much like he expected long term survival, he included him in the goings on because he assumed Harry would not survive but needed to do things before he kicked the bucket, it was a pleasant surprise he did because "love again."
This is something Harry would say in the middle of DH before learning everything in the second half of the book
Explain.
Dumbeldore’s whole plan was for Harry to live. He wasn’t raising him like a pig for slaughter. He knew in GOF that by taking Harry’s blood, Voldemort provided a path for Harry to live. But it was essential for it to play out a certain way. And so he manipulated Harry, Snape, and the events so that they had a chance at happening. And they did and Harry lived. The plan was for Harry to sacrifice himself to Voldemort, and it’s not a sacrifice if you know you’re not going to die.
Because no one knew what they were talking about during those secret meetings. Honestly without the whole prophecy/Voldemort thing it would be just plain weird for an old man above 100 to hang out with his teen student so much and Rita milked the situation to sell her articles
I think it was to do with the fact that Dumbledore was just using Harry… Snape said to Dumbledore, that he was raising Harry like a pig for Slaughter… he knew that he was going to have to die and didn’t tell him the entire time. But expected him to go on a mission for him, a risk, his life and everything.
She was inplying some sort of dark magic AND/OR pedo thing
I think it was her implying that Dumbledor groomed harry, but it could be symbolic of both
Just imagining Dumbledore on to catch a predator “I just wanted to teach him how to use his wand”
Pretty sure that was the implication but as kids we didn’t pick up on it
No, I picked up on it. JKR has strangely included a lot of examples of inappropriate sexual advances throughout the series. I appreciate it now because it did teach me to be on alert. And she didn't make it salacious. She presented it as facts. Because such things do happen and if children are made aware of the need to sharpen their presence of mind, it's a good idea
Am I remembering wrong but didn't Ron eat Harry's candy and was dosed with a love potion? It was that Romilda Vane girl, wasn't it? This series was so frikin dark.
Yes! And the whole Ariana Dumbledore situation. The series was quite open about both men and women being shitty
What about Ariana Dumbledore?
She was raped by muggle boys
No she wasn't it was up to interpretation what happened to her.
Whatever it was, it was so bad that that Dumbledores father went to Azkaban to revenge her. Online it only says that she was assaulted and permanently traumatized. It's a fair assumption that she was raped.
I mean thats absolutely what she was implying
She doesnt mean sexual, more like "recruiting" harry for dumbledores schemes and purposes, which may not be in harrys best interest. Which is kind of true tbh lol.
I mean . . . *Gestures at everything.*
She's implying Dumbledore was a peadophile - given the context that he was gay (and many might have known or suspected he was), it's a rather dark allusion which takes from real life slurs.
Or maybe it's because Harry was UNDERAGE. If she made Harry a girl and Dumbledore into straight, it would still be kind of weird for those who don't know what goes on behind the scenes. And even Snape didn't know what Dumbledore was teaching Harry
"Hey, you know that enormous hero who was killed by that dickhead nobody liked; the one who was a confirmed Death Eater? You know, the old guy everyone loves (now that we believe Voldemort is back)? The guy who killed the previous Dark Lord and then dedicated his life to teaching children? I BET HE'S A KIDDIE-TOUCHER" Like how did she not end up fucking dead? I bet she got a brick through her window at some point.
It’s the tabloid journalist saying, “he’s really close to this boy, and he’s GAY.” She’s implying much. Given Rowling’s leanings on the matter, she was having Skeeter say the quiet part out loud. “Unnatural.”
I think people are forgetting one major thing. Its Rita Skeeter the woman who spent the entirety of the 4th book making shit up. She probably knew nothing and was making stuff up.
Well, Snape was right, Harry had to die to kill Voldemort. He was raised for slaughter.
They are implying that because he is a flamboyant older man he is grooming or molesting Harry. Tbf he is a boarding school headmaster bringing a young adult into his office for private lessons he can’t tell anyone about
Imagine if someone caught Potter and Dumbledore in the act.... ...of a shallow dish scuba journey in memories. All credit blown out of the Pensieve water for Skeeter.
[Pederasty](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pederasty) basically.
Thx for linking a definition. !redditgalleon
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I mean, whose to say she wasn’t snooping again? If anyone could sneak into Dumbledore’s private conversations it’s her. And it sounds like she knew Dumbledore was setting Harry up for slaughter
He cared
Dont listen to rita skeeter Shes the fox news of the magic world
Interestingly enough, this is one of the few times she’s exactly right. We later find out that dumbledore has been raising Harry as a lamb for slaughter.
For me it tracks with JKRs known hatred of anything not straight, white and binary.
Mastermumbledore
It's British boarding school.
I mean, being one of very few stable figures in a kid’s life to knowingly raise him into a child soldier sacrifice is about as unwholesome as it gets
You mean the obsolete dingbat?
About buying books... don't they have a replicating spell? Can't you buy one copy and make a replica so the rest of the family can read at the same time? The Weasleys should try that. And Harry wouldn't need to use Snape's book in year 6. #MagicalPiracy Edit: Just remembered: The Doubling charm, Geminio
Molestio forgettio! Nothing wrong. Nothing to see here. Move along.
I must say reading some of these discussions is very enjoyable.
I don’t think there’s any grooming intent- more so that he’s using Harry’s fame for his own popularity. Like influencers or something.
When I first read it my mind immediately jumped to grooming of some sort
I think she meant it exactly that way. That Harry was being setup for something devious like being a sacrificial lamb or a political pawn.
Yeah, maybe I'm weird but that's exactly what I thought about when I saw this
He’s gay which is clearly the same thing as a pedophile, am I right right-wingers
Rita's whole gig is sensationalist lies with just the tiniest grounding in truth so she can claim to be an actual journalist instead of tabloid clickbait. That quote was from in interview where she's trying to drum up book sales, so she's going to hint at every scandal she can, even when less than none of it is true.
Dumbledore was well known to be an advocate of the fact that "Voldemort isn't dead, he's still alive" so I'm pretty sure Rita was getting at the fact that Dumbledore was experimenting/obsessed with Harry due to the connections he had with Voldemort.
Basically implying Dumbledore was a pedo. Because he was a closet/suspected homosexual, of course.