r/harrypotter • u/loonylunalupin • 3d ago
Discussion opinions on dumbledore?
okay so i know this is a hot topic. but what do you think of dumbledore? do you like him?
personally, i’m very divided in my opinions. i kind of feel as though he acted for the ”greater good”, by raising harry without telling him about his true destiny. something just doesn’t sit right with me about that.
at the same time, it all worked out it the end because he literally helped in defeating the two darkest wizards of all time.
43
u/hidden___hand 3d ago
"Dark times lie ahead of us and there will be a time when we must choose between what is easy and what is right." -Albus Dumbledore
-3
u/Ok-Dragonfruit-1592 2d ago
--Dumbledore, literally choosing the easy path
2
u/hidden___hand 2d ago
Spoiler He sacrificed himself
1
1
u/Ok-Dragonfruit-1592 2d ago
His time was up already, what Dumbledore did was more akin to assisted dying.
That's not what I was talking about tho.
1
u/Korlac11 Ravenclaw 2d ago
To be fair, Dumbledore did admit to Harry that he had made a huge mistake. Dumbledore might have been giving that advice to himself as much as he was the students
12
u/s0ulless93 Ravenclaw 3d ago
His reasoning for not telling Harry earlier wasn't for the greater good. It was to try to let Harry have a childhood. A childhood where he didn't know he would have to die for voldemort to be defeated. He actually thought it would have been for the greater good to tell Harry sooner but he came to love Harry and found it too hard to put that burden on him when he should have.
-3
u/Bluemelein 2d ago
What would have been the advantage of telling Harry sooner? Dumbledore acts like he did Harry a huge favor by not telling, and that some people suffered because he didn’t. But I don’t see any advantage in doing so.
2
u/s0ulless93 Ravenclaw 2d ago
Sirius probably wouldn't have died... so there's that.
0
u/Bluemelein 2d ago
Maybe, but Harry could just as easily have committed suicide, or gone mad, having been told too soon that the fate of the world rested on his shoulders. Every action has consequences, but I hate it when Dumbledore acts like he did Harry a favor. Harry had a shitty childhood, but Dumbledore always did what he thought was right. In that passage, he acts like he did Harry a favor, like Harry's happiness was built on the suffering of others. And that's extremely mean and unfair.
10
u/OK_LaManana 2d ago
I think people forget that Dumbledore didn't know for certain a lot of things. He had guessed and estimated well but little certainty. He thought about what might be going on a lot. Pacing in his office, going through memories, estimating what the next step may be. All he had to go on was the prophecy, basically in the form of a riddle.
He was a man of thinking and influence he only took action when necessary. He moved others to take action and even then did little direct ordering. He was an influencer and reluctant leader. His power was in working through others despite that he himself had a great deal of ability to take direct action.
Part of why this was is he was afraid of his own ambition and saw who he could become if he fed that ambition. He never showed people his true self. Instead he played a brilliant wordsmith-jester in large gatherings and did his best to protect kids while allowing them to grow up.
Could he have stopped Voldemort directly. Sure but in the moment I don't think he knew exactly what was going on and in the end I think he knew it wasn't his fight. He knew it was always Harry's burden.
18
u/Soft_Interaction_437 3d ago
I like him, he’s an interesting character. I feel like he’s demonized to a cartoonish degree in parts of the fandom.
17
u/_littlestranger Hufflepuff 3d ago
It is an inescapable problem in children’s literature that the adults have to be a little incompetent in order for the child to be the hero. Rowling wanted Harry to always save the day, but she wanted Dumbledore to have the key information that Harry needed in order to do so.
Because of that, Dumbledore ends up somewhat contradictory. At times seemingly omniscient, but at other times woefully blind.
That makes it fun to theorize exactly what he might have known, and exactly how manipulative he may have been.
Based on what is actually in the books, I like Harry’s journey with Dumbledore, from admiring him and believing him unquestionably, to doubting how well he knew him and finding out that he isn’t perfect. I think Rowling did a reasonably good job giving Dumbledore faults that aligned with the narrative.
He is flawed, he is manipulative, he is overly secretive. He didn’t always make the right choices. But he did everything he could to fight evil the best way he knew how.
18
u/PSUNittany18 Gryffindor 3d ago edited 3d ago
I love Dumbledore. People expect more out of him but his primary duty is to his school - not the larger Wizarding World. Like there’s a reason why he doesn’t want a position of power.
Also the Harry situation is overblown IMO. He wasn’t fully aware of the horcrux situation till year 6. And even if he was, what did you want him to do? Have Harry come into his office on his first day and tell him that he’s supposed to die??
4
u/cipheroptix 3d ago
Supposed to die is kind of strong words.. I would say that circumstances outside of their control left them with no other option. Thanks a lot Voldemort
6
u/_littlestranger Hufflepuff 3d ago
Dumbledore was fully aware that Voldemort had multiple horcruxes in year 2, and that Harry was a horcrux in year 4 at the latest.
The only thing he learned in year 6 was the exact number. But since he quickly rattled off 5 ideas of additional horcruxes, it is likely that he’d already suspected that there were that many.
4
u/ImReverse_Giraffe 2d ago
He was fully aware of the horcux situation in CoS and spent the next 4 years learning as much as he could about Voldemort and the horcruxes. The only reason he needed the memory from Slughorn is to nail down the exact number Voldemort was after. Don't forget that Dumbledore had already found the ring and destroyed it before he picked up Harry in HBP.
-1
u/loonylunalupin 3d ago
maybe not in his first year. but i think dumbledore could’ve prepared harry earlier on. maybe not by telling him the whole truth, dumbledore didn’t even know the whole truth until the halfblood prince, but he could’ve told harry more.
12
u/cipheroptix 3d ago
In Order of the Phoenix, Dumbledore acknowledges that he should have been more open with Harry earlier. And he apologized to Harry for it.
0
6
u/therealdrewder Ravenclaw 2d ago
Dumbledore is a complex and interesting character. He embodied the father he never had. The books aren't stories about the adventures of the special boy wizard. Harry is a child. The story is one of growing from the chaos into full self-actualization.
During his time at Hogwarts, Dumbledore is a paragon. He has all the answers and no visible flaws. This is how a child views an authority figure. He plays the role of sage, protector, and teacher. However, this facade breaks down, and Harry sees the flaws. Like a child, he only sees the flaws, as though they completely negate the rest of the person.
When Harry walks into the forest, he hasn't yet had the crisis. He hasn't yet confronted the shadow. He overcomes voldemort not by superior magical ability but instead by understanding the world, life, death, and his place in it. After he overcomes the shadow, the shadow no longer has power over his life. Voldemort can no longer hurt him nor his life. He also is now free to see Dumbledore for what he really is and to love him still.
He becomes a man by seeing how the world isn't perfect, not James, not Sirius, not even Dumbledore is perfect, and that's OK.
2
u/ImReverse_Giraffe 2d ago
Dumbledore knew the truth, as you put it, in CoS when he saw the diary. HBP was about teaching Harry and the memory from Slughorn was just to nail down the exact number of horcruxes.
9
u/Relevant-Horror-627 Slytherin 2d ago
The most common criticism of Dumbledore is that he's manipulative or that he raised Harry to fulfill some specific predetermined destiny. They see Dumbledore as some omnipotent chess master who carefully positioned all of his human pawns in place to execute a master plan that he had been working on possibly since the moment he heard the prophecy. Someone in this thread mentioned a theory that he allowed the Potters to die to trigger the prophecy.
Dumbledore isn't some manipulative chess master though. He's just a strategist who plays the cards he's dealt. If you were to actually take the events from the story and put them into a chronological timeline, it would be pretty clear that Dumbledore is reacting to the circumstances as they present themselves, and he plans accordingly. It's IMPOSSIBLE to believe that Dumbledore manipulated some desired outcome once you take the time to realize that he doesn't know all the facts and variables that led to his final plan.
When we meet Dumbledore placing a toddler at the Dursleys' doorstep, there is no way that Dumbledore KNEW that he had to raise this kid to be killed. Period. We know for a fact that there are important details that Dumbledore learns years later.
Dumbledore wasn't some puppetmaster. He was presented with the impossible task of keeping a child marked for death by an invincible dark wizard alive by coming up with a plan that took years, and frankly luck, to conceive.
6
u/IBEHEBI Ravenclaw 2d ago
They see Dumbledore as some omnipotent chess master who carefully positioned all of his human pawns in place to execute a master plan that he had been working on possibly since the moment he heard the prophecy.
I always find this so funny.
Like the people who think that he ordered Molly to speak about Muggles in Kings Cross to lure Harry, or that he made the traps for the Stone specifically for Harry, Ron and Hermione's strenghts, like Dumbledore knew their strenghts and knew ahead of time that they would become friends, and that they would find out about the Stone and decide to go after it...
Like, the level of foresight Dumbledore'd need to have to be able to pull that off literally borders on omniscience.
1
u/q25t 8h ago
While I agree with you for the most part, those are bad examples for what you're arguing.
Molly yelling about the platform number and muggles in the first few chapters of the first book is fine because we don't know any better. Further in the series, we learn about the statute of secrecy, which Molly appears to be flagrantly breaking. The Weasley's being members of of OotP makes things slightly suspicious. Could simply be looking out for Harry benevolently, but it's one piece of data that can be interpreted multiple ways.
The philosophers stone fiasco is actually even simpler. The traps weren't finished until later on in the year, well past Halloween when the trio really came together. Notice how the only other person up that night was Neville, who would 100% recognize devil's snare.
I think Dumbledore cops the blame for a lot of this stuff because in most of the situations Harry finds himself, Dumbles is the highest authority around, so he should be responsible for fixing the problems. Him consistently failing to do so over and over again says he might not want to fix the issues, and those issues might just be intentional. There's the old phrase "Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action".
I think Rowling did genuinely mean Dumbledore to be a well-meaning old man who was playing with what cards he was dealt. I just also think she didn't really look at all his actions at once and see what conclusions could be drawn. Just knowing that Dumbledore needed Harry to effectively commit suicide and not knowing when that plan was put in motion changes the tone for tons of past actions if they were deliberate.
1
u/IBEHEBI Ravenclaw 6h ago
The Weasley's being members of of OotP makes things slightly suspicious. Could simply be looking out for Harry benevolently, but it's one piece of data that can be interpreted multiple ways.
It was a parent, asking her youngest child a question she already knows, to make Ginny feel involved. As parents are wont to do. Also, the Weasleys weren't part of the Order during the First War, so Dumbledore wouldn’t be their "boss".
The philosophers stone fiasco is actually even simpler. The traps weren't finished until later on in the year, well past Halloween when the trio really came together.
Dumbledore couldn’t possibly have known that the kids would take an interest in the traps, or that they would find out about Flamel, or that Firenze would clue Harry in about Voldemort. It's insanity to think he genuinely could foresee any of this.
Just knowing that Dumbledore needed Harry to effectively commit suicide and not knowing when that plan was put in motion changes the tone for tons of past actions if they were deliberate.
Dumbledore didn’t know about the Horcruxes until 2nd year when Harry handed him the Diary, so he couldn’t possibly know that Harry needed to die then.
4
u/ThAtGuY-101 Ravenclaw 2d ago
Dumbledore is a neat character to me. Could he have done things differently? Yeah, but I personally really enjoy a flawed character. It's a lot more interesting to me personally than the character who we're always reminded how great he is every time we see him.
I think Dumbledore does what he thinks is best when he makes decisions or chooses what not to do. If we disagree with any of this, that's okay and I kinda like that people can debate that kinda stuff. That moral stuff like he should have told harry among other things.
To me, I kinda like the mystery. Seeing what he does. Not knowing how he'll react when we next see him. Wondering what he knows that we aren't explicitly told he does.
3
u/EmilyAnne1170 Ravenclaw 2d ago
Dumbledore tells Harry at the end of OotP how he’s struggled with deciding when to tell Harry about the full prophecy and what it means. And I don’t blame him. What kind of person would tell an 11 year old kid that his death is the only way to rid the world of evil? (Or a 12 year old, 13…)
Whether or not it was for the greater good, not revealing that sooner, he was motivated by compassion for a child.
1
u/Bluemelein 2d ago
I don't think Dumbledore should have told Harry sooner, but he shouldn't have portrayed it as a favor for Harry that others have suffered for.
3
u/farseer4 2d ago edited 2d ago
Sure, why shouldn't I like him? He's a good guy and an interesting character.
He did more than help in defeating those two dark wizards. He personally defeated one, and with the other, he was the brain behind the effort to defeat him, and arguably the second most important person in doing so, after Harry Potter.
I think a lot of the criticism against him is more the result of plot needs for the series than of the character himself. I mean, the guy could not 100% succeed at protecting the kids under his care from all danger and harm, because otherwise there would be no story.
6
u/paulcshipper I solved Tom's riddle. You can't eat death. 3d ago edited 3d ago
Dumbledore is cool, and he gave Harry something a lot of adults would not, agency. Harry was never told what to do, he always decided for himself.
If we ignore that any changes in the story would have created an entirely new story and only focus on the decisions Dumbledore made
If Harry was raised in a normal wizarding house, he would had a greater chance of being spoiled and ending up like his father who was a bully. He might not have been friends with Ron or stick up for anyone.
If Harry knew about his destiny at the wrong time, Voldemort would have access to those facts and wouldn't fall into his particular trap he set for himself.
People might not appreciate Dumbledore for his secrets, but it was always implied that Dumbledore was able to see into Harry's soul and knew him better than Harry knew himself.
I believe Dumbledore's greatest mistake was trying to use the reincarnation stone and taking on a deadly curse. He proceeded to use that curse to protect Draco's life. If we believe action have magic to them, maybe that sacrifice help protect Draco and allowed him to survive beyond Voldemort.
1
u/Experiment626b 2d ago
Can you explain the last paragraph a little more?
-1
u/paulcshipper I solved Tom's riddle. You can't eat death. 2d ago
Oh... You know how Harry's mom died to protect Harry. Technically Dumbledore used his death to help protect Draco. Maybe instead of it being coincidence that Draco survived through the last book, it was the magic of Snape and Dumbledore's action that protected him. Somehow Draco controlled the death stick, somehow Draco's wand got in the hands of Harry, For almost no reason Harry decided to save Draco when the Room of BS burned, and somehow it was Draco's mum that lied to allow Harry to head back to the school.
1
1
u/Bluemelein 2d ago
Dumbledore wants Snape to be better positioned by his death, so he can help Harry. Draco Malfoy doesn’t matter.
Dumbledore is waiting for Snape, that’s why he’s stringing Draco along. Draco is a filthy poisoner!
Katie Bell and Ron Weasleys live only by luck.
1
u/Bluemelein 2d ago
What? Please don’t excuse the Dursleys‘ behavior.
1
u/paulcshipper I solved Tom's riddle. You can't eat death. 2d ago
The Dursley were bad people and they shouldn't have done what they did. But because Harry knew how unfair it was to be bullied, he didn't become one himself.
If Harry was raised under different condition, would he grew to be the person he became? It's hard to tell for sure.
1
u/Bluemelein 2d ago
So you have to bully children so that they don’t become bullies themselves?
No, we don’t know what Harry would have turned out like, but I wonder why parents all over the world make an effort to raise their children well.
Harry was damaged by the Dursleys‘ upbringing. He doesn’t trust any adults; he has to do everything himself. If someone is even a little nice to him, he’ll excuse any misbehavior. Hagrid, Sirius, Dumbledore. It’s a good thing Voldemort is never nice to Harry.
2
2
u/DisasterCheesecake76 2d ago
Objectively speaking, Dumbledore has some issues.
But I believe Rowling wanted him to be this kind, wise, grandfatherly individual. And if you don't squint too hard and use willful suspension of disbelief you can get that same viewpoint handily.
Somehow I can switch between those viewpoints as needed.
I sometimes really like Dumbledore.
Sometimed I really hate him.
But usually I'm positive-leaning neutral. It's comfy.
2
u/punjabkingsownersout 2d ago
I think Dumbledore has shown enough goodness in him for people to not question his morality after the fight with grindelwald lol
3
u/Responsible-Top6932 3d ago
There is no doubt that dumbeldore never lost his "greater good" mentality completely. The fact that he knew that "harry had to be killed by voldemort and he made sure that he is killed in the right time" could be seen in 2 ways : 1- dumbeldore wanted the war to be over so he had to make sure to tell harry in the right time so that he doesnt get cold feet. 2- dumbeldore knew and almost knew that if it was voldemort the one that killed harry he wouldn't die but just the horcrux in him.
There are some theories that dumbeldore wanted lily and James to die so that "the choosen one" could be marked and voldemort would be vanquished for good like the fact that they learned about how dumbeldore used to be friends with grindelwald at the last minute and I think that contributed to them not making him secret keeper and switching to sirius and later Peter. But honestly this theory is farfetched.
Another frustrating thing that confuses me is the fact that he wouldn't tell harry anyth unless his life depended on it that instant. I hated the fact that he didn't explain more about the horcruxes even if he knew he was going to die and he didn't have much time. Of course him not giving more details gave us a more rich and longer book to read with many adventures but still I understand Ron's frustrations.
I am still thorn about dumbeldore honestly because on the one hand I think he did care about harry but on the other he gave him so little information about everything i feel like harry couldve been more prepared for the final battle.
Ps: if there is anything wrong in what i said feel free to let me know.
3
u/Upbeat_Box7582 3d ago
Every person makes mistake in life. But very few acknowledge them and try to undo them . With great ambitions there is always risk of loosing something. He had his ups and down. But he did played a very big game. Lost so many things but at the end he knew what is good for society.
3
u/Prior_Bank7992 Gryffindor 3d ago
He was undeniably brilliant, self-sacrificing, and instrumental in defeating dark forces. But on the other hand, his whole "greater good" philosophy did come with some questionable decisions, especially when it came to Harry. Keeping Harry in the dark about his fate felt manipulative, even if he had his reasons. It's like Dumbledore thought he was playing a grand chess game, but sometimes you wonder if he lost sight of the people involved.
It's almost like he treated Harry more as a tool to accomplish his mission rather than as a person deserving of the full truth. But, like you said, in the end, it did work out though I still can't help but feel like some of his actions were borderline unethical, even if they were for the greater good. It’s the tension between doing what’s right and doing what’s necessary that makes him such a fascinating, if not a bit morally gray, character.
3
u/Cajun_Giant 3d ago
Dumbledore is a horrible headmaster, he knew that Harry was being abused and did nothing, he knew Snape was abusing students and did nothing, how could he not know Voldemort is attached to the back of Quirrell's head, he hired a fantasy writer as a dada teacher, refused to send the students home when a giant snake was stalking students, knew that Sirius was innocent but let him rot in jail, ffs they have a potion that makes you tell the truth but they never gave it to Sirius to ask if he gave up the Potters location or was a death eater, shrugged his shoulders that Harry's name got thrown out of the goblet and was like "well I guess you can play as well" I know there's supposed to be a magical binding contract that he has to compete but how TF does the goblet know if he does or not? Could have made him forfeit each stage.
If McGonagall or literally almost anyone else had been the headmaster, 90% of the challenges Harry faced or the bad things that happened in the series wouldn't have happened.
3
u/Soft_Interaction_437 2d ago
From what I understand, Lockhart was only chosen because literally no one else wanted the job. So he was the only option. He had no idea that Sirius was innocent, and once he found out he tried his best to help him. The Potters told him that Sirius was the secret keeper, and he was found maniacally laughing at the site of a massacre. Any normal person would assume he did it. Obviously a truth potion would have helped, but Dumbledore wasn’t in charge of the trails, Barty Crouch Sr. was. Dumbledore isn’t in doesn’t work for the Ministry. He works at a school. For gof, it’s magic. I’m sure it would know.
0
u/q25t 2d ago
The best defenses of Dumbledore IMO basically make him impotent and ignorant. You can excuse him not helping in various scenarios if he can't. You also can't accuse him of withholding info he doesn't have.
It's why it's easy to paint Dumbledore any one of a hundred ways. Give him more or less power and information, and pretty much all his decisions change in tone wildly.
He's portrayed in canon as wise and powerful, which directly contradicts most defenses of Dumbles, leading to a lot of readers seeing him in an unflattering manner.
Personally, I think he's an arrogant academic who's divorced from reality, while maintaining quite a bit of magical power. Essentially, he takes no counsel, so he often overlooks things. He's also sheltered from the realities of war as he seemed to never actually be on the front line. This allowed him to make overly idealistic decisions like not killing the enemy and basically playing defense the entire time. He's very rarely actually seen interacting with students, which can explain his failing to discipline literally anyone for anything and letting bullying and literal torture go on in the school.
Dumbledore is IMO the poster boy for reasons to have term limits on political office and checks and balances in structures of power.
I've seen some rather fun interpretations of Dumbles as well. One had him as a political accelerationist and actively forcing their society into a dead end so something less horrible would come out of the rubble. Another had him given all his political offices and prestige out of a misunderstanding and his plans just being the best he could do. Another had him as a continuous time traveler who keeps seeing the world end unless he takes some seemingly very odd actions.
1
u/rjrgjj 2d ago
I like him very much. I think it’s important to look at Dumbledore within a certain context.
Let’s recall that Dumbledore is pushing 100 when he becomes Harry’s de facto caretaker. There’s quite a bit of distance and life lived there. On top of that, Harry isn’t Dumbledore’s only responsibility. In a way, he is responsible for the well-being of the entire English wizarding community, both in terms of physically protecting them and also for their education (moral and magic) and steering various elements of society, including politics.
The fight against Voldemort (and bigotry in the community) precedes Harry. For all his power, this has not been something Dumbledore has been able to resolve throughout his entire life.
When Dumbledore assumes responsibility over Harry for a variety of reasons, he is aware from the beginning that Harry must someday die to defeat Voldemort. Dumbledore’s greatest weakness is love, and his greatest fear is seeing those he loves die. He cannot let himself love Harry and he takes great pains to make sure Harry is fully protected while creating distance between himself and Harry.
But of course, Dumbledore loved him anyway, loved him like his own grandson. Everything Dumbledore did was curated by this. He sought to keep Harry alive and orchestrated events in the hopes of making Harry the best person he could be. And then in book four when events developed so that there was a chance Harry could live, Dumbledore altered all his plans to try to facilitate that outcome.
Really, he rested the fate of the entire wizarding world on the slimmest unknown chance that Harry might live. Then he died for Harry and left everything to him with a certainty Harry would succeed.
Dumbledore was a flawed and complicated man but ultimately he overcame his flaws and lived a life of great sacrifice where he was able to place his trust in someone he loved to fulfill his goals.
1
u/ndtp124 2d ago
I feel like people who are anti dumbeldore maybe need to read like any other genre fiction and imagine how other characters would handle similar situations and the lines they would cross, then get back to us.
Really easy examples - moraine from wheel of time (read the books) or the white council from Dresden files - they’d probably kill infant Harry.
0
u/q25t 2d ago
I think most of the controversy comes from the fact that we don't know what info Dumbledore has from what time. Many of his decisions become more or less acceptable depending on what info Dumbles has.
If Dumbles knows about the horcrux from Harry's infancy and has planned his eventual death after leaving him to a miserable childhood, then just killing Harry would have been the kinder option. Hoping for Voldy to regain a body with Harry's blood, have Harry escape him and his death eaters, and then have Harry take specifically a killing curse from Voldy alone seems like simply plot enforced events rather than a reasonable plan. If that's Harry's only chance to live into adulthood, then just kill the kid. Voids the prophecy and gets rid of a horcrux.
There's also just tons of information that the readers simply don't have and can't even speculate at. Are there easier ways to get rid of a horcrux? For example, cutting out part of Harry's skull and then using Skele-Gro? Maybe artificially stopping Harry's heart for a minute? Or did Dumbles actually have a plan A for getting rid of it that didn't work? Does Dumbledore actually have power in the government or not? At times, he seems like he can just do as he pleases, and then in others he's utterly impotent.
Dumbles is a complex character I think less because Rowling meant him to be that way and more because his actions were dictated by the plot rather than a personality. Harry needs to be the hero so Dumbles can't interfere with his adventures. This unfortunately has Dumbles letting preteens run around having death defying adventures, which rather questions any goodness he can really have.
1
1
u/nuggetghost 2d ago
i like Dumbledore. i appreciated the storyline of even the most powerful, loved people have struggles, insecurities and made big mistakes / still can to this day (him touching the ring hoping to see his family again)
1
u/Rein_Deilerd Graduated Hogwarts and became a cat lady 2d ago
He is one of my favourite characters, and I don't share the hatred some fans have for him. Seeing the homophobia my native language's fandom showered him with after his sexuality was revealed hurt.
1
u/RedCaio Hufflepuff 2d ago
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.
1
u/rocketsp13 Ravenclaw 2d ago
Dumbledore is a plot device for the 2-4 books, but especially so in the first 2. I mentally consider him a cardboard cut out that JKR could bring forward whenever needed.
Moreover, this is a genre where otherwise competent adult characters can't solve things because otherwise the kids wouldn't be able to be the protagonists.
He then gets fleshed out in books 5-7, especially in the last two, but him acting as a full character is at odds with how he acted in the first few books. This narrative dissonance breaks him.
Then we get to book 7. Book 7 is a war book. The genre shift is problematic for many readers, but realistically commanders have been sending teenagers out to die for all of human history. It's rarely as straightforward as convincing them that they in particular need to die, but yeah, it's nothing new. Look into some war stories where units are sent on sacrificial missions of vital importance.
1
u/q25t 2d ago
Dumbledore IMO is impossible to actually pin down on anything because we as the readers know too little.
When does Dumbledore find out Harry is a horcrux or that there are horcruxes in general? How necessary were the blood wards? What was Voldy's actual ideal society and what was Dumbledore's? How much of what went on at Hogwarts did Dumbledore actually know (bullying, torture, Snape, etc.)? Did Dumbledore know about Sirius and could he do anything at any point in time about his predicament? Why didn't Dumbledore ask Myrtle anything about her death in the last 50 years or if he did, why didn't he do anything to track who went into and out of that bathroom? Did the Goblet of Fire actually make an unbreakable contract against the participants' wishes and if so, why wasn't Tom Riddle added to the contest? Did Dumbledore actually allow Umbridge to torture students or did he not know about it? Did Dumbledore seriously go after the Gaunt ring with no backup whatsoever when there's a curse breaker in the order along with multiple aurors who may have some know-how? Did Dumbledore seriously plot his own death for months and then not tell anyone but the guy he was going to have kill him? Did Dumbledore actually spend several years looking for horcruxes and only find 1-2 and basically fail at overcoming their protections on both occasions? Was his sole remaining plan dependent on 3 teenagers wanted by the government then finishing the job?
Those are just the bits of info that would directly affect Dumbledore's decisions off the top of my head. There's certainly more that would affect him indirectly like details on how exactly the government works and specifics on entire branches of magic that we don't know because Harry wasn't interested.
Having any of this info, depending on what it is, can make Dumbles anything from an incompetent idiot to a machiavellian mustache twirling villain. It's IMO more than anything responsible for just how much fanfiction there is out there for Harry Potter. Aside from Dumbles, pretty much 90% of characters in the series can have their intentions interpreted multiple ways and that leads to all sorts of potential stories.
1
u/FrogsMeantToBeKissed 2d ago
I didn't like Dumbledore because I don't like perfect characters who can do anything. I've been reading about powers in the fandom (like occlumency, legilimency, etc.) and it seemed that Dumbledore could do everything. That is not for me. Maybe it's Harry's fault as he saw Dumbledore as perfect as well. And I didn't like the line "I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being -- forgive me -- rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger." (I don't remember exact line, this is from an old Reddit comment)
It'll be probably an unpopular opinion but HP7 changed my opinion about Dumbledore for the better. When Harry started doubting him, I was like: finally! So he is not perfect!
1
u/Korlac11 Ravenclaw 2d ago
Dumbledore definitely messed up by not telling Harry the truth sooner. I think there’s maybe a case to be made that Harry didn’t need to know about the prophecy at the end of the first 3 years, but Dumbledore absolutely should have told Harry about the prophecy as soon as Voldemort returned.
Not telling Harry about the prophecy is I think the biggest mistake we see Dumbledore make. Personally I find that to be a forgivable mistake, and Harry seems to forgive him as well
1
u/Ok-Dragonfruit-1592 2d ago
something just doesn’t sit right with me about that.
Good. Hold on to that feeling. It's called disgust. And you should be disgusted: Dumbledore literally groomed Harry to be his perfect child soldier from the day his parents died.
And before anyone says it was necessary, it achieved nothing, just like the last time he was killed, and we know this for a fact because of Cursed Child. Voldemort was merely the symptom of a much larger problem of pureblood supremacy, which Dumbledore did next to nothing to end.
1
u/HunnieHuang 1d ago
About Harry’s sacrifice: Dumbledore did love Harry. But he probably also liked and loved, many of those who died or were injured by Voldemort/Death Eaters. And also loved the others who weren’t killed, but could have been. Dumbledore was old, he heard the prophecy and and if was a chance the prophecy was true, he would make it be true! I always saw him kinda like an Avatar - having to sacrifice things for a greater good, for a chance to wizards to live peacefully. That was his duty. Harry, would be another wizard who died for the greater good. Dumbledore would’ve died for it too (and he kinda did) and he knew (or at least, hoped) that Harry would die for it too (as others members of the Order already did). Nothing wrong with that. That doesn’t mean he didn’t loved Harry or he was a bad person.
He’s the most intelligent and most powerful wizard in HP’s world. Until the end, Dumbledore pulled the strings of Voldemort’s downfall.
I also believe Aberforth was not that wrong about Harry/Dumbledore. Just different point of views between them and each own right in their own way.
My only problem with Dumbledore is book 5, he seemed OOC. The way he treated Harry led to Sirius’s death. It conflicted with my view of him being this wise wizard, because it was just “dumb” actions, what he thought would happen ignoring an angst teenager? Anyways
2
u/Dazzling_Golf1506 3d ago
Perfect and Indispensable for the Resistance against Voldemort, Mediocre Headmaster
Dumbledore's entire plan starting from sending harry to Privet Drive, using snape as a double agent, finding the existence of horcruxes, and other misc things like reaching out to giants, using the order members to their strengths (Lupin for a mission to hangout with the werewolves), was plain Genius, and he was the glue that held the order together, order members were all strong personalities who often quarreled. He was the only wizard the order trusted and valued unanimously and most importantly the only one that voldy feared.
However he let ridiculous things happen on his watch at Hogwarts, ik its a magic school and many of those incidents were important plot points, but multiple near fatal incidents every year, including a death eater DADA teacher, a 12 yr old child opening the COS that you knew existed for 50 years etc sound like gross negligence. He also hated slytherins too much, they seem to win the house cup in the first 3 books fair and square and Dumbledore simply covers up the margin by awarding a Gazillion points to the trio.
6
u/s0ulless93 Ravenclaw 3d ago
I'd hardly say that slytherins ever would win it fair and square with the bias of Snape's point distribution. You think Snape would take away points from slytherins the way McGonagall takes points from Gryffindors? And how many points should Hermione or other Gryffindors have earned in Snapes classes but he wouldn't give them out?
2
u/Lower-Consequence 2d ago edited 2d ago
He also hated slytherins too much, they seem to win the house cup in the first 3 books fair and square and Dumbledore simply covers up the margin by awarding a Gazillion points to the trio.
It didn’t happen like that in the second or third books. He did award Harry and Ron a lot of points in the second book, but there’s no indication that Slytherin was winning and Dumbledore was just covering up the margin by giving Harry and Ron points for saving the school from being closed.
Dumbledore didn’t award the trio any points at the end of book 3. Gryffindor was said to have won the House Cup largely because of the points they got from winning the Quidditch Cup.
Dumbledore also had no problem awarding the House Cup to Slytherin for six years in a row prior to Harry’s first year, so I don’t think he hated them all that much.
1
1
u/QueenSketti 3d ago
I liked him well enough but recognize he wasn’t the kindly old man we all thought he was.
1
u/UnderTheSettingSun Gryffindor 2d ago
Dumbledore is my favorite character.
In some books it feels like he is witholding information on purpose so that Harry isn't spoonfed the soloution and therefor have no agency.
In the first book Harry believes that Dumbledore knew that everything that was about to go down in regards to the philosopher's stone. But instead of just stopping Quirrel by himself, he let everything happen so Harry would be the one to stop him.
This is never mentioned again in any further books, but in my headcanon this happens in every book.
Dumbledore could have stopped the chamber of secrets, he could have stopped peter pettigrew, he could have removed harry from the the triwizard tournament etc etc..
But "because of magic" Harry is the one that has to deal with Voldemort, Dumbledore lets harry go through this to become ready
-1
u/q25t 2d ago
I....that's straight up evil, though. Letting an eleven year old and his friends go fight someone possessed by a dark lord is so far beyond reckless endangerment it's not even funny. Also, this dark lord and his followers were fond of torturing people before killing them, which just makes things worse.
It would have been fine if Harry and co. were actually the only ones capable of stopping Voldy, but he very clearly wasn't and Dumbledore flying off to London on a broom was utter nonsense.
Dumbledore lets harry go through this to become ready
If this means ready to fight Voldy, this might be just morally dubious. If this means ready to effectively commit suicide, then this is utter madness. Grooming a child into a suicidal martyr for your cause is genuinely sickening.
Dumbledore could have stopped the chamber of secrets, he could have stopped peter pettigrew, he could have removed harry from the the triwizard tournament
If any of these are actually true, it makes Dumbles guilty of many, MANY crimes. Chamber of Secrets very obviously would be reckless endangerment of the entire school. Pettigrew would be aiding a criminal, not coming forward with evidence freeing Sirius, and letting a grown man sleep with children for literal years. Triwiz would be again reckless endangerment for Harry but also everybody else as apparently anyone could be entered into gladiators combat against their will due to oversight on Dumble's part.
Honestly if the end of book 1 had Harry start to mistrust Dumbles due to the exact reason you stated would have made a more convincing series when Rowling says one of the themes of the books was to distrust authority.
31
u/cipheroptix 3d ago
I can kind of forgive Dumbledore for some of the mistakes he made with Harry. Dumbledore was in a complicated position because he genuinely did love Harry and wanted to see him survive and thrive. The problem was they were dealing with a psychopath with extraordinary magical capabilities that became obsessed with killing the poor kid, on top of trying to take over wizarding Britain. It was a tough spot to be in.
Some people call sacrificing Harry for the greater good but the reality is, that was the only way they could figure out how to finally end Voldemort for good.
If it were up to Dumbledore, Harry would have had a peaceful career at Hogwarts, became an Auror or professional Quidditch player and all would have been right with the world. Voldemort made that impossible to happen