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Headscratchers: Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Albus Dumbledore Good Or Bad
  • Was Albus Dumbledore a good or a bad man? Did his painful history make up for his Chess Master and Manipulative Bastard streak? Was his manipulation of everyone, but especially Harry and Snape, justified in any way? My opinion is that if you can forgive Dumbledore for mercilessly manipulating the people around him, especially Harry and Snape, than you should also forgive Snape for his sarcasm and insensitivity in the classroom - both are equally damaging, if in different ways. I don't think you can say anyone is a "good" or a "bad" person: I don't forgive either Dumbles or Snape for the aforesaid specific actions, but both have painful backstories. I tend to be harsher on adult!Dumbledore though, because he gets no criticism by any of the in-story characters after DH (except Rita Skeeter — but that's a given) and adult!Snape got more than enough criticism and punishment for his actions. Dumbledore's actions were more subtly damaging and his bullying was more of a subtle coercion. Yet he gets no criticism by Harry or anyone else. How is Harry, one of the most affected by Dumbledore, able to blindly dismiss Dumbledore's bad actions? He doesn't get angry at all — and neither does anyone else... Strikes me as unfair, considering how much damage he did.
    • Also, in the chapter "King's Cross," Dumbledore says to leave the baby, there's nothing they can do. Harry agrees without a backward glance. WHAT. FLAT WHAT. Sure, it's the last, smallest remaining piece of Voldy's soul that wasn't tainted by the Horcruxes. It's also a crying, flailing, helpless baby. And Dumbles (and consequently Harry, who always blindly obeys him) can't even do the compassionate thing and comfort a little baby.
    • It was not a little baby. It was Tom Marvolo Riddle feeling at last the damage that he himself had inflicted upon his own soul. Dumbledore says that they can't help, not that they should not bother. What can be done to comfort a broken soul that seems to have even lost sentience? Voldemort didn't remember the pain or Harry and Dumbledore's chat not far from where he lay, so if there was a chance for him to be saved (which Dumbledore said so himself), it had to happen back on Earth.
    • I assumed that the baby-thing was the Horcrux that died with Harry - as it was a piece of soul from Voldie's last murder of...very many before his first defeat, it was likely extremely corrupt and unsalvagable by that point.
    • Also, its not like he said "Eh, just leave it there." and Harry just accepted that. After DD tells him he can't help it, Harry asks about it twice more and glances it at it with DD telling him it can't be helped by them at all.
    • Okay, can I just say... what the hell? Why do people seem to take away this perception that Dumbledore is a Manipulative Bastard or in any way not the Big Good? People criticize him for leaving Harry with the Dursleys, but it provided him with the optimal protection, sheltered him from his fame to prevent him from getting a big ego (something he explains from the very first chapter of the entire series), and it is never indicated that he knows that Harry is emotionally, verbally, and at least a bit physically abused. People criticize him for the whole "customizing the Philosopher's Stone gauntlet to Harry's Nakama, putting them all in danger" thing, but note how he came in with almost perfect timing to keep Harry from getting his ass killed. He wanted Harry to have his chance, and flew to his rescue as soon as he knew it was needed. People criticize him sending Harry off to be Jesus, but it quite literally had to be done in order to stop Voldemort. No Big Good in their right mind is going to save one person at the expense of everyone Voldemort threatened. This troper honestly does not understand in any way, shape, or form the abuse that people insist on giving Dumbledore. He was manipulative, yes, but being a Chess Master does not make you a Manipulative Bastard. Everything he did, it was with the interests of everyone in mind, not just himself and his own agenda. He was the Big Good, through and through.
      • Well, allow me to retort. For once, D couldn't possibly not know how Harry was treated, seeing how his very fucking own agent lived across the street from the kid and babysat him on occasion (that is, of course, if you're so firm on insulting everyone's intelligence by suggesting that he didn't keep a personal eye on him). The allegedly "exceptional" qualities of his vaunted protection have already been much doubted over on the relative pages of this discussion, namely how it completely failed to protect him from Dementors in B5. The attention was also called to the indisputable fact that the "almost perfect timing" would've done jack squat if it wasn't for the unwieldy IdiotBalls Rowling kept foisting off on the villains every moment it became obvious that our nincompoop of a hero had once again got himself into another mess he can only possibly escape feet-first. Neither did it escape notice how the esteemed Headmaster four times allowed enemy agents with various extents of malice prance around the school under his charge, resulting in the final score of two dead and a dozen more spared only by highly contrived coincidences. All of that before Fridge Logic kicks into high gear and you begin see the galore of perfectly valid opportunities for the conflict being resolved as late as B3 or B4, each and every one of which the cunning Dumbledore successfully fucks up, thus being more or less directly responsible for the blood bath of Deathly Hallows. So, in fact, an unbiased look at DD reveals a complete opposite of a true Chessmater - a reckless, sentimental old fool, who bet countless lives (and lost many of them), on an infinitesimal chance that he'd be able to bring that one kid through alive and even "not ruin his childhood".
      • If he was watching himself, then he wouldn't have needed to leave Mrs. Figg there in the first place. And who's to say that she could have had any idea what was happening to Harry? Recall that the Dursleys are obsessed with appearance, so of course they wouldn't give her any reason to suspect anything was wrong. Hell, even being given the slightest background on his parents would reinforce that, if they gave the excuse that he was a troublemaker and under punishment when they left him with her; anyone who knew anything about James Potter as a child wouldn't be that shocked. As for the rest of that criticism, and the various Idiot Balls, recall that Albus Dumbledore worked with Quirrell for years while he was the Muggle Studies teacher and either taught or presided over as Headmaster of every single Death Eater, and Voldemort himself. He probably knew them more than well enough to predict most of the things they were going to do, including the things that required the Idiot Ball, which just so happens to be one of the defining traits of a Chess Master. And losing lives? It was a god damned war. In any war, especially one with extremely powerful weapons like wands, there is no chance of coming out without a number of casualties on your side, no matter how brilliant your commander is, especially when you have explicit moral boundaries like Dumbledore's side towards Dark Magic and Unforgiveables. The plot could not have been resolved in Book 3 due to the Stable Time Loop and the consistently repeated point that you do not mess with time, ever, and while, yes, Dumbledore ultimately fails to prevent Voldemort's return at the end of Book 4, it's arguably a good thing, as it ultimately set Voldemort up for his downfall as per Book 7. Not to mention, and this is a biiiig part of it, the way it ended, even with the body count stacked as it was, could easily have been the best case scenario. We don't know, being outside of the Harry Potter universe, how reliable proper prophecies like Trelawny's are. If they are 100% accurate, then guess what, Harry was the only one who could have defeated Voldemort. So yeah, setting up the giant gambit to ensure Harry survived the second Killing Curse, destroying the last Horcrux, and allowing Harry to ultimately win, was the only route he could have taken. People who make accusations towards Dumbledore make them without having all the facts and relying on guesswork and their own personal fanon, pure and simple. There is nothing in canon to indicate that the prophecy could have been false, that Dumbledore knew the extent to which Harry was abused and neglected, anything at all. There is only speculation and postulation that often goes counter to Occam's Razor, assuming far too many things when the far simpler answer is "Dumbledore was always working towards the destruction of Voldemort with as few casualties as possible."
      • I think Mrs. Figg DID know, based entirely on one of the few lines she had: "I was to keep an eye on you but not say anything, you were too young. I'm sorry I gave you such a miserable time, but the Dursleys would never have let you come if they'd thought you enjoyed it." This implies that Mrs. Figg knew very well how Harry was being treated, if she knew the Dursleys wouldn't want Harry to have fun (which is why they had her babysit him in the first place, so he couldn't go with them when they went places), and the fact that she wanted him to have fun shows she didn't believe him to be a troublemaker. Dumbledore also knew how Harry was treated, if his conversation with Harry at the end of book 5 and his conversation with the Dursleys in book 6 is anything to go by. Dumbledore only kept Harry at the Dursley's because of the blood protection on the house that kept Voldemort from going after Harry while he was at Privet Drive. Harry would've been better taken care of in another home, but being at the Dursley's kept him alive, which was Dumbledore's ultimate goal in respect, as he explains at the end of book 5.

  • I don't think he was good or evil, just senile and too well-respected for anyone to criticize him. Let's see:
    • He wanted Harry to have a normal childhood, but doesn't know about the abuse at the Dursleys? He's either willfully ignorant, or he knows and doesn't do anything. Both are bad. Third option: he considers that a perfectly normal childhood. He's just senile, then. A Fidelius charm can hide Harry even better than a blood ward can, and he could have been put with a loving family. Dumbledore can be the secret keeper. Before you say that he doesn't want to be personally involved, he already is. Only he, and a select few he has personally chosen, know where Harry Potter lives. He's already made Harry Potter a secret and he's the secret keeper — might as well cast the spell that actually offers real protection. The blood wards stopped working at the end of 4th year, BTW.
      • First off, the blood wards did not stop working at the end of 4th year. The personal magical protection on Harry's body did. The blood wards were shown to be working just fine, as evidenced by the fact that Voldemort didn't come burn Number 4 Privet Drive to the ground and had to attack via a proxy outside the range of the wards. A Fidelius Charm would have required a wizard to be the one raising him, and he explicitly stated he wanted him raised outside of the Wizarding world to keep him from getting a swelled head. There is nothing to indicate that he knew about the abuse at the Dursleys, or that he would have felt the need to look in on Harry personally. He is shown to put a great deal of trust in people, and thus would likely have trusted Mrs. Figg's judgment. As pointed out above, Mrs. Figg couldn't have known any more than the rest of Privet Drive would have, as the Dursleys are obsessed with appearance.
      • "You did not do as I asked. You have never treated Harry as a son. He has known nothing but neglect and often cruelty at your hands." (emphasis mine) That's a direct quote from Dumbledore in chapter 3 of Half-Blood Prince. So yes, Dumbledore knew exactly what Harry was going through... and still kept sending him back there.
      • Yes, he did. Because it was better than letting him be killed.
      • Doesn't fly. If Privet Drive is truly the only place where Harry can be safe, then why does Dumbledore allow him to ever come to Hogwarts or Grimmauld Place? Contrariwise, if Harry can also be kept safe at Hogwarts or Order HQ, then why does he have to return to the Dursleys? And no, 'because the law' doesn't fly either; Petunia Dursley would gladly sign Harry's custody over to anyone, if Dumbledore would only allow her to. Dumbledore already feels able to keep Harry saef from Death Eaters for 10 months out of every year without using Privet Drive; I fail to see why he can't exert himself a little more and make that 12 months.
      • Because until book 4, as long as Harry could call Privet Drive home (which means returning there after school during the summer), Voldy could not touch him. The end of Goblet of Fire, however, made it so that the blood protection only works on Privet Drive rather than Harry himself, so after book 4, you still raise a valid point.
    • First year: again, allowing a murderer into a school. When catching a bear, you do not set a bear trap inside the kindergarten classroom. Even if the kindergarten teacher is the local expert on hunting bears. Find a substitute to take that job and catch a criminal properly. Standard argument is that the mirror was for Voldemort and everything else was for Harry: Bullcrap. You don't try to give a kid a "normal childhood" and then hint to him he's the hero who has to save the world himself. Unless, of course, you're senile and you think that making him a hero and drawing the entire school's attention to him by giving him a ludicrous number of house points will help him be a normal kid.
      • Murderer? Are you talking about Quirrell, who Dumbledore did not know was host to Voldemort?
      • Snape knew that Quirrell tried to murder Harry at the quidditch match (Quirrell says as much in the final confrontation with Harry); Dumbledore still let Quirrell stay on-campus the rest of the year. After knowing that Quirrell had already tried to kill a student. What The HELL, Dumbledore.
      • Why are we assuming that Dumbledore meant for Harry to hunt down Quirrell? Imagine what would have happened if Harry just wasn't there. Voldemort would have gone through all the trouble of bypassing the teachers' security, only to find out, much to his dismay, that he can't get the stupid stone out of the mirror. Because of the convulted way the security was designed, he probably wouldn't have been able to get out in time and had to face Dumbledore in full power while he himself was a weakened parasite. If anything, Harry's presence made everything more dangerous, but of course it wouldn't do to say that to a boy who just barely escaped death (and well, Dumbledore has never been objective in regards to Harry).
      • Mostly because the "security" was very very obviously designed for the Trio to pass, and because Harry was being dropped oh so subtle hints by both Hagrid and DD the whole year as to how reach the stone. As to why did DD do it - it was to introduce V to Scarhead and to test his courage and resolve, all the usual Mentor-to-Hero stuff.
    • 2nd year: he was present when the chamber was opened the last time. He knows it was opened now. He knows this beast can kill with a single look (Myrtle). He knows roughly where it happened and who was actually responsible. Why did Hermione figure it out before you, Dumbledore?
      • Who's to say he didn't figure it out? It's entirely plausible that he did and couldn't actually do anything about it, unless you want to tell me he picked up Parseltongue somewhere.
      • If you believe that he did figure out that the same killer monster that murdered a student 50 years ago is back, you don't need to speak Parseltongue to tell everyone to evacuate the school. Multiple students only survived by sheer coincidence. Calling him an old fool who couldn't figure it out is as nice as I can be to him, short of calling him evil and willing to risk the lives of his students for... what, his reputation?
      • Wasn't Dumbledore's position at the school taken from him (as well as Hagrid's) during Harry's second year? If Dumbledore wasn't actually there, it's possible he wasn't able to figure it out. Even if he could figure it out without being at the school, how the hell was he supposed to let everyone know and have the school evacuate? He didn't have the power to do that at the time.
      • Dumbledore wasn't removed as Headmaster until after Easter.
      • Also, how can he 'let everyone know'? Hmm, I dunno, maybe send Acting Headmistress McGonagall an owl?
    • 3rd year: why make Harry risk his life again instead of saying this: "Miss Granger, I need to borrow your time-turner." No, Harry, it's up to you to be a hero. Like a normal child with a normal childhood.
      • Because he had enough details about the Stable Time Loop to know that it was Harry and Hermione who were supposed to go, that's why.
      • He only sees Harry and Hermione return safely after their mission was a success. Nowhere along the timeloop do they meet Dumbledore and confirm anything — Harry1 and Hermione1 could have survived, brought the time-turner to Dumbledore, went back in time, saved Buckbeak, saved Harry1 and Sirius's life... and then died. The Time Loop would still be stable.
      • He had to let Harry and Hermione be the ones to perform the rescue, because Dumbledore wasn't personally acquainted with Buckbeak himself. Hippogriffs aren't tame or predictable animals; if Buckbeak had taken an initial dislike to Dumbledore when he approached, he wouldn't have been able to sneak away with him quietly enough to avoid Fudge and Macnair. Better to trust the ones the animal was already on good terms with.
      • Again, doesn't fly. Dumbledore can apparate and use portkeys on Hogwarts grounds; he is, in fact, the only person who can do this. He would not need a hippogriff to get to Sirius' window; hell, he wouldn't even need to use the window. Bamf in to the room, give Sirius a portkey to Bermuda, bamf out. Borrow Hermione's time-turner to give himself an alibi. Done and done, and it wouldn't even take him five minutes. Hell, he can do all this and still send the kids out to cast a patronus because time paradox. Or hell, send the kids out and follow behind them wearing the Invisibility Cloak and cast the patronus himself.
    • It's much worse than that. An alternative interpretation is that D actually arranged the Tournament with Harry in view and orchestrated his involvement through Moody (great minds think alike indeed) and then allowed the kid to be taken to the cemetery to facilitate V's resurrection (remember that "look of triumph" in D's eyes? Yeah).
      • The "look of triumph" was because Voldemort using Harry's blood both allowed him a potential path to redemption via Lily's love and bound him and Harry together, allowing the Horcrux in Harry's scar to be destroyed without Harry himself dying (notice how Dumbledore doesn't actually start properly grooming Harry to go like a lamb to the slaughter until after this happens). This "alternative interpretation" is honestly ridiculous. As to the original point, no details are given about the magical contract, but that doesn't automatically mean it can be gotten out of, or that the penalty for going against it was small. There is nothing to indicate that Dumbledore wouldn't have tried to get Harry out of it if he knew how to.
      • He could have helped teach him the skills to survive. Nothing in the magical contract could have said anything about teachers helping the students, or else Harry, Fleur, and Krum would all have received magical punishment/disqualification.
      • "To survive"? The competition wasn't meant to be life-threatening.
      • Not so much. Remember, the entire reason the Tri-Wizard Tournament had been cancelled in the first place is because too many people were dying in it.
      • Maybe Dumbledore suspected that Harry put his name himself, it's possible that with the Horcrux inside he could pass the age line (which raises even more questions)
      • Harry is pathetically easy to read with Legilimency. Dumbledore is a master Legilimens. This theory posits that Dumbledore not only assumes as first hypothesis that Harry is lying to him (as Harry violently denied doing any such thing), but then goes on to not use means easily within his grasp to determine the truth, and then goes on to allow Harry to continually face life-threatening experiences in service of this unflattering lack of belief in Harry's honesty. Or, more simply, if we go with this theory then Dumbledore's really fucking Harry over here. Which is why I'd rather not go with that theory.
    • 5th year: Voldemort has been back for a year already and now considers Harry a very personal target to eliminate, Harry just witnessed a murder a few months ago, and his visions are getting worse. What does Dumbledore do? Keep Harry in the dark about everything. He sends members of the Order of the Phoenix out to risk their lives to protect a recording of a prophecy without even telling them why or what they're guarding. Which he still refuses to divulge to Harry until he is forced to. Oh, right, because he wanted Harry to have a "normal childhood," right?
      • Part of the reason for keeping everyone, especially Harry, in the dark is to keep the information from falling into the wrong hands. The second part of the prophecy is explicitly what they're protecting from Voldemort, and they've had traitors before, so of course he's not going to tell anyone what it is (they obviously know that it's a prophecy given that that's what they're guarding, and they know the reason why is because it has information Voldemort wants. Doesn't really need to get more specific than that). As for Harry, he's keeping him in the dark on the prophecy because he doesn't want a teenage boy to feel the weight of the world on his shoulders, and he keeps him in the dark about everything during year five because, as he explicitly stated, he didn't want things getting through the link in his head to Voldemort. And beyond that, despite the fact that that was more than a good reason, he apologizes for it at the end of the book, both for closing himself off from Harry and for hiding the prophecy from him, not even batting an eyelash when Harry destroys half his office.
      • Dumbledore does more than apologize in that conversation; he flat-out admits that he made the wrong decision in trying to keep Harry in the dark, and that as a direct consequence of that decision it is his, Dumbledore's, fault that Sirius Black died. So, given that even Dumbledore himself agrees that he screwed the krup here, I think that settles it.
      • No, it doesn't, because his "admittance" doesn't make any goddamn sense. "Oh, Harry. I cannot possibly ruin your pleasant ignorance and shoulder this terrible burden on you by telling you that some half-crazed crow you have no respect for had made a prophecy that Riddle'd totally fell for thus becoming much more predictable and vulnerable, and that you don't have to fall for, because only you should rule your destiny, as i'm gonna belatedly explain to you the next year when I finally run out of stupid pills. Instead I'll leave you seathing with impotent rage, guilt you must be feeling for inadvertently causing Sedrick's death and assisting in Voldemort's ressurection, and frustration over being abandoned by your friends and your mentor. For the entire summer you will been eaten alive by insurmountable urge for action which I could harness to teach you Occlumecy and other useful skills, but will instead completely waste, adding to your boredom and desperation! This is how precious you are to me - so precious I will completely disregard your feelings and show zero respect to you as a person!" Oh, and Sirius' death wasn't his direct fault - it was a fight, and he was a casualty. It could've just as easily been any other Order or DA member. It was totally and exclusively Scarhead's fault, unless, of course, you blame DD for carefully nurturing him as a reckless idiot, which I totally do.
      • Nope, its Dumbledore's fault. The Ministry battle doesn't happen unless Harry believes the vision that Voldemort sent him. If Dumbledore had so much as taken one sentence out to warn Harry that its possible to create a false vision, Harry wouldn't have gone. But nobody ever bothers to warn Harry that this is possible, therefore Harry treats the vision of Sirius being tortured with equal seriousness to the vision of Arthur Weasley being bitten. And that's the point: you cannot put the fault on Harry's decision-making when Harry is being denied need-to-know information without which no informed decision is possible. And Dumbledore is the person responsible for choking off Harry's information flow. All your sarcasm won't change this fact: it is not Harry's fault for having to guess blind, it is Dumbledore's fault for keeping Harry blind.
      • Do you honestly believe that the kid's unawareness somehow justifies rushing into a situation he had no possible way of mastering? Fake vision or not, he knew (or thought) that V was waiting for him, meaning that his sorite could only lead to his death and deaths of those he dragged along. It is only thanks to Lucius' defection that they got away with just one casualty (it had to be, for I refuse to believe it is possible for a man to fuck up THAT hard but still remember how to breath.) And besides, I would disagree that the fake viwion was the decisive factor. It was a convinient mean to lure the kid in, but by no definition the only possible one. Remember, one way or another V had already managed to do it thrice. Why? Because Harry Potter was a reckless idiot with huge trust and discipline issues, a tremendous hero complex and stunted self-preservation. And he was shaped that way by DD's sage and progressive mentorship. So don't get me wrong, of course DD was guilty, just not the way people seem to admit he was (you know, all that "he cared about Harry too much" bullshit).
      • The # of people Harry 'dragged' along to the DOM is zero. Or did you miss the scene where Harry yelled at them all to stay behind, he could not justify risking anyone other than himself on such lousy odds, and they all demanded — repeatedly — to stay with him anyway? There's a Headscratchers about it on this very page! As to the main thrust of the comment, that Harry is stupid for going in against such long odds; Harry knew how long the odds were, but Sirius is basically the only father he has left. Criticizing the hero of a book for showing courage is usually not of any use.
      • Fine, those who volunteered. As if it would have consoled their grieving parents much. As I see it, if he was the leader, then the responsibility for his people was also his, whether it was coercion or (IMO misguided) sense of loyalty that drove them. As to the the main thrust, forgive me for being such a bore, but shouldn't there be a line between showing courage and merely throwing your life away? Rebels flying against the Death Star or the westerners riding against the Black Gates, that's courage. They knew they were very likely, or even guaranteed, to die, but they also knew what they were doing and how it was supposed to work towards their cause. They had a plan, you see. Now, what was Scarhead planning, or hoping, or going to do, when he found Sirius lying on the floor and V standing next to him? Nothing. He was going to die, all his friends were going to die, and their deaths would not have helped Sirius in the slightest. The odds were not long - there weren't any, and he knew it. There's no heroic merit in thoughtlessly throwing your life away - any numbskull can do that. If anything, it dishonors the memory of those who had sacrificed their lives for him, just like Remus had told him, but why would he care to remember? Unless, of course, thanks to DD's progressive mentorship, he actually came to expect that something would intervene at the last moment and save him, but I see even less heroiс merit in that.
      • Yeah, definitely going to disagree there. Courage doesn't require intelligence, all it requires is that you are willing to face something you are totally afraid of, regardless of how much of a good idea it is to face that thing. And with that situation, all Harry thought he knew was that if he did nothing, Sirius would die. Doing something, which has a chance, however small when you calculate it, is preferable than doing nothing. Doing nothing instills a feeling of helplessness. Doing something gives you a feeling of Agency. And besides, he's faced down Voldemort several times at this point and managed to get away. Lets not act like Voldemort is as invincible as he thinks he is. And besides, Sirius only died as a casualty of battle. In the original scenerio, Voldemort would have been taken by surprise with Harry arriving, since he didn't realize Harry was being sent the visions. But in reality, it was actually a trap and Sirius only died as a casualty of battle. If things happened slightly differently, it was entirely possible they could have all gotten out alive. So despite Voldemort having every advantage available to him, Harry still came in, clowned on him, and managed to get away unscathed except for Sirius dying. The fact that something like that can happen, and has happened before in his adventures, justifies the notion that Harry's presence, despite being the objectively weaker wizard, can make a genuine difference.
      • re: the root comment above, what "wrong hands"? Voldemort already knows the key information being kept concealed from Harry; that the second part of the prophecy is in the Department of Mysteries, that Voldemort will do anything to obtain it, and that its possible to send fake visions as well as real ones down the Occlumency risk. There is no reason to keep Harry in the dark on this shit; even if Voldemort hears every word you tell Harry, Voldemort already knows what his own plan is. And given that Death Eaters have already encountered at least one Order guard hanging around outside the DOM, Voldemort also already knows that the Order knows he's after the Prophecy. Dumbledore is either seriously lying to Harry or to himself when he goes 'But Voldemort could get the info through you!' — the only piece of info Voldemort doesn't already have is the second half of the Prophecy itself, and Dumbledore could still have shared more than enough info to save Sirius and/or avoid all this mess without having to get into that specific bit.
    • 6th year: at some point within this year, he has already decided that Harry must die. That actually very neatly explains why he doesn't bother training Harry at all, but instead spends all their evenings making sure Harry knows Voldemort is totally evil in the slowest method possible. He has not confirmed what the "power the dark lord knows not" actually is, mind you — his theory is that it's love. He suspects that the scar is a Horcrux, but as far as we can tell, has made no attempt to find a way to get rid of it without killing Harry. And Draco? Don't mind him — he can still save this young, innocent boy who is casting unforgivables and attempting murder. So long as he's not successful, he's still innocent, right? Again, good, evil, or senile? If you're not going to pick senile, then the best you can hope for Dumbledore is "good, but a Manipulative Bastard."
      • Whoever you are, I'm officially in love with you.
      • The memories are to give Harry insight into Voldemort as a person, something that is absolutely important in fighting a single enemy. Draco isn't him thinking he can save an innocent boy who's turning to darkness, but him knowing that Draco has absolutely no desire to be involved in any of it and is only trying out of fear for his family because of the major mistakes that his father made. And it is not a theory that the power the Dark Lord knows not, it's a basic deduction; Harry is an otherwise average wizard of somewhat above average intelligence and power who is mainly skilled and dueling and combat because of all the personal training he did over the course of Book 4 for the Tournament and Book 5 in the DA. He doesn't have any evidently special powers aside from the magic coursing through his veins as a result of his mother's love. Meanwhile, love is one of the very few things that Voldemort is incapable of comprehending. So therefore, logically speaking, Harry's special "power" is not, in fact, a power at all, it's his capacity for love, and the ways that he expresses it (the whole Chronic Hero Syndrome thing). Furthermore, the "Horcrux in the scar" is not a longshot guess, but another easy conclusion based off of the various magical shenanigans that happen relating to the scar and Voldemort. Voldemort feels strong emotions, they leak through to the scar. Harry sees things happen through Voldemort's eyes and the eyes of his snake (also a Horcrux). Harry's scar hurts whenever Voldemort is around (the chunk of soul trying to reunite with the original). It's not a guess, it's basic logic, to the point where people in real life without any actual knowledge of Horcruxes or how they work in a living container figured it out before Book 7.
      • The problem with your so-called "basic logic" is that your train of logic is "Dumbledore said it, therefore it's true." That's also JK Rowling's way of inserting Word of God into a story: have Dumbledore say it. It's bad writing because anyone who understands that Dumbledore is only human will realize how many holes are in his reasoning. First, insight doesn't require a holographic video experience spread out over months, we understood it just fine by reading about it in a book. Dumbledore could have summarized it in one evening. Second, regarding Draco: he's already over the deep end. He has already used an Unforgivable and twice attempted murder. He is no longer a child needing a way out, he's a criminal needing to be locked up, yet the speech Dumbledore gives him in their final confrontation leads me to believe that he thinks Draco is still an "innocent" boy who's incapable of murder. Earth to Dumbledore: he's attempted it twice. The power Dark Lord knows not: many other things, including all things Muggle. Both of them are half-bloods, but Voldemort severed all his Muggle roots while Harry didn't. It could have been the power of luck — Harry is damn lucky throughout all the novels, and Voldemort had a very unlucky childhood, parentage, heritage, etc. The power of love is such a vague "power", you even admitted that it's not really a power. It could have been the power of righteousness and justice, for all that it mattered. The scar Horcrux: only a simple conclusion because Dumbledore said so. If Horcruxes are bound to physical objects, couldn't he just amputate the scar? All the Voldemort-related pain that Harry had ever felt was always centered around that particular tissue, after all. This costs almost nothing to try out and could save Harry's life if it works — nothing, not even a medical scan of some sort, is performed. If Occlumency could block the connection, then it suggests a mental link, not a spiritual one, unless Occlumency is also the art of soul-manipulation of some kind. The fact that Voldemort himself possessed Harry in Book 5 without noticing anything and could fully control their "connection" after he discovered it means that souls are either really easy to manipulate with magic, or it's just a shallower type of link. Regardless, Dumbledore doesn't ever attempt a "safer" solution for Harry, but jumps straight to "Harry must die." When playing with people's lives, I prefer to go on more than "educated guesses."
      • I just want to point out, I don't think Draco was off the deep end at any point. It seemed pretty obvious to me that he never did anything he did really because he felt comfortable. He tries to kill Dumbledore with the necklace and wine, but think about it. These are about the most weak attempts at murder ever possible. If they worked, they would require him not even having to see Dumbledore, only hearing about his death the next morning or whatever. It's the easy way out. He doesn't have to look at him while he kills him. He doesn't have to think about what Dumbledore or anyone would think of him because no one would ever know. Dumbledore knows that Draco is never serious about wanting to kill him because when Draco is face to face with him, he can't do it. He's scared, he doesn't know what to do, he's in fear of what will happen to him if he doesn't go through with it. Draco was not a nice guy and even downright vile, but not a true murderer even with his attempts. He was just a scared kid trying to follow orders to save himself and his family.
      • So he's a murderer AND a coward. This makes things exactly?
      • He's a coward because he doesn't WANT to be a murderer and is only attempting murder to save his family. He doesn't want to kill Dumbledore at all, he just feels he has to or else his family will suffer he consequences.
      • The Memories in HBP are completely useless and could be all told in a single hour. Ron's WMG was that the tutorial sessions were to train Harry in super-dooper magic skills. The point of the Memories was that Harry would have no knowledge and no power and waste the year on the camping trip from hell. The Power the Dark Lord knows not is not and never could be Love. Voldie War I, Death Eaters made parent obey by threatening their children. Voldie War II, DE-s made students obey by threatening their parents. Riddle was perfectly aware that people love. Love is merely the power the Dark Lord feels not. The power that killed Riddle was random wand rules. DD needed to protect Draco for the Greater Good. Riddle rose to power with Malfoy money. Harry forgave Draco, so Draco will have the money to fund the next Dark Lord.
  • Ok, let's get them all excuses in order for debunking.
    • "DD and Arabella didn't know Harry was maltreated". Bullshit. Harry's invitation letter is addressed to the "closet under the stairs". If DD knew where the boy freaking slept, there's no way he didn't know the rest. And in B5 Arabella, apologises to Harry for boring him to death during his stays at hers, because "if the Dursleys knew you were having a good time at mine, they would never left you with me". So again, the Dursleys were fooling noone. And finally, during his confession, DD admitted that he'd knew beforehand that Harry would be maltreated.
      • Yes, they knew he was being abused. What do you purpose he do about it? Harry needed to stay there for the magical protection living with blood relatives grants and Harry had no other blood relatives. Yes, he could pop in every now and then and threaten the Dursleys but what would that acomplish? It would make them frightened and angry and they'd just take that out on Harry as soon as Dumbledore was elsewhere. It's not until Harry's actually old enough to somewhat defend himself that threats from wizards to leave Harry alone have any chance of working, due to the simple fact that he needs to stay with them.
      • Pay them. Do them some favors. Befriend them. Explain how pissing Harry off makes him liable to outbursts of accidental magic, and how important it is that he doesn't slip to Dark Side. Seriously people, what is wrong with you? Why are the only proposed option of interaction are insults and/or intimidation?
      • Because it wouldn't work. At all. The Dursley's aren't reasonable when it comes to magic. People don't just stop being abusive because someone knows, or because they've offered them bribes. Any witch or wizard attempting to befriend them would have never been able to reveal what they were or even discuss the subject of magic without the Dursley's shutting them out. If Petunia's own sister and raising her orphaned son didn't do a thing to soften them towards the subject then nothing was going to. It's a simple horrible truth that Harry and Dumbledore are aware of and are resigned to until Harry turns 17.
      • You know what really wouldn't work? At all? Sending three teenagers after the relics of the most powerful evil sorceror in the world. Once you've entertained that idea seriously, you really have no excuse to dismiss the possibility of befriending a bunch of stuck-up ignorami. Mind you, when I say befriend them, I don't mean "wake up one day and think: "Oh, fuck! Dursleys have been abusing Harry for the past twelve years! I'd better do something about it!" - I mean beforehand. Take the trouble to actually appear in person and explain everything, not leave some stinking note. Maybe even go an extra mile and put on something respectable at that. Warn them about the outbursts of accidental magic and how being agitated or threatened would make Harry more prone to them. Tell them that for any additional information they might refer to Mrs. Figg (they'll understand the implications, and yes, people do behave better when somebody knows). Yes, offer them to compensate for all the expenses, and add some bonus for their troubles. Shortly speaking, treat them like actual people and not act like you've rendered them some unfathomabe honor by entrusting them with a holy mission of raising the little bugger.
      • Which is still wrong, because the blood protections only require that Harry share a roof with someone else of his mother's blood. Vernon Dursley is only related to Harry by marriage; getting him out of the household (say, by having him arrested and jailed for child abuse?) and leaving behind Petunia and Dudley (living off a stipend that Dumbledore provides, since they no longer have Vernon's income) would ensure Harry at least wasn't flagrantly abused, even if the environment was still a tad chilly. Particularly if Dumbledore made the point that if Petunia didn't start acting like a human being, she'd be the next to go... after all, little Dudders alone is still a relative sharing the blood of Lily Potter, and Dumbledore could easily arrange for them to be fostered in the same home. And before somebody goes 'Intimidation!', I might point out that the only thing proposed here is that Vernon (and if necessary, Petunia) have inflicted upon them the normal penalties of law for offenses that they have actually committed.
      • So you solution is to destroy a family, incarcerating a husband and father and believeing that wouldn't turn Petunia and Dudley against Harry even worse? Petunia is specifically mentioned as being the necessary ingrediant for the protection to keep working and there's no way in hell that's going to be doable if Dumbledore starts actually messing with her family. I get that you want to find a work around for the situation, and that's fine, but actions have consequences and you need to think about them when coming up with plausible solutions. If Dumbledore is willing to violate people that badly why not just place the family under direct mind control? Wouldn't be any further over the line than what you've suggested.
      • I'm supposed to weep tears over Vernon being a 'husband and father'? Vernon is also a child abuser; those belong in jail. You're actually saying that child abusers should be gone easy on because they're parents. That's as absurd as killing both your parents and then demanding the mercy of the court because you're an orphan. Also, you're saying that 'sending a guy to prison for crimes he has legitimately committed' is morally equivalent to 'Imperius curse mindrape'; that's ridiculous. And you're also factually wrong; the blood protections specifically require a blood relative of Lily Evans, but there are two people in the household who fit that description; Petunia, and Dudley.
    • "DD couldn't leave Harry in a wizarding family under a Fidelius charm." So, you're basically telling me, that in all the England, there wasn't a single wizard (including DD himself) responsible and level-headed enough to raise a celebrity child in reasonable severity. I will just leave it at that, because nothing I could say would prove my point better than that.
      • No. There isn't a single adult wizard that wouldn't worship Harry like prince. Harry stopped Voldemort, something even Dumbledore failed to do. Because of Harry Potter the Dark Lord is gone, the Death Eaters roundedup or in hiding and they don't have to spend every day in fear for themselves and their loved ones. A decade later Harry is STILL getting preferential treatment from the wizarding community until Fudge decides to smear his image and even that only goes so far.
      • I find this hard to believe. People like Remus would have raised Harry very well. And even if he had to be raised by muggles, it didn't have to be the Dursleys. It could've been a nice, random muggle family (or maybe just Arabella if Dumbledore wanted someone who knew about the wizarding world).
      • Remus? Seriously? The man could barely take care of himself. He turns into a wolf at periodic intervols, how would he take care of Harry during those periods, can't just leave an infant or young child alone for that length of time and he was never shown having any real friends until the order reformed? What do you think the wizarding community's reaction would have been when they discovered that their savior was in the care of a werewolf? The wizarding community can not be objective when it coms to Harry Potter, he's either their savior or their bane, depending on which side they were on during the war. As for Muggles, it had to be the Dursley's because Dumbledore could only work the protective magic he felt was necessary on the home of Harry's blood relatives. If anything else would do he would have moved into the Burrow after his second year, there's no doubt they would have taken him in and treated him much better.
      • That's why the suggestion was "people like Remus". You know, people with brains, not necessarily werevolves.
      • Well, hardly a random Muggle family, since their house would've essentially dissapeared from the map, but definitely people like Lupin.
      • And even barring Lupin, you've at least got Mcgongall, who is established as the wizarding world's Only Sane Woman about two pages into the first book.
      • Alternately, there's Andromeda Tonks. She's actually related to Harry by blood (second cousins on the Potter side via the Black famly tree, as is every other Black of her generation), and unlike the rest of the Black family she isn't a Death Eater, married to a Death Eater, or in Azkaban. Also, she married a Muggleborn wizard, so Harry would not only grow up with competent and loving parents (just look at Tonks for how good a job they did), but experienced in both the Muggle and Wizarding worlds, best of both worlds. And again, looking at the job they did with Tonks, I seriously doubt they'd let Harry grow up with a big head.
      • Andromeda is related on the wrong side, Petunia is the only person (in series) related to Lily.
      • They're not second cousins. Dorea Potter's son wasn't James.
      • Second cousins merely requires that you share a great-grandparent in common. It doesn't matter whether Dorea Potter is James' mother or his mother's sister, either way it still works.
      • Or for extra hilarity, Moody. Granted, Harry would probably grow up just a tad eccentric and loaded down with combat skills no wizard his age should be having after having been raised in isolation with old Mad-Eye, but could you imagine a safer environment? CONSTANT VIGILANCE!
      • Also, DD could actually explain to Harry's would be-foster parents that V's fall wasn't Harry's merit, but his mother's, and therefore they shouldn't venerate him.
      • Hey, remember how the Weasleys "venerated" Harry Potter and spoiled him outrageously in everything and let him get totally egotistical? Nope, me neither.
      • I remember Arthur and Molly adoring him to the point where I can't remember a single instance of them actively scolding him for his reckless actions and endangering Ron and Ginny along the way. They only focuss on what good he's caused and they don't have the means to spoil him as he doesn't live with them long term and can't afford anythign Harry can't buy for himself. The problem with these ideas is that we see how these people react once harry is already developped as a person and meetinbg them for short periods. We have no ide how they may have favoured him if he'd been dropped on their doorstep right after Voldemort fell, And a FC won't work as it only affects a location or piece of information so if Harry so much as went outside the protection would be lost and there would be nothing stopping a Death Eater from nabbing either the person or their loved ones and getting the information out of them by force. Petunia's blood protection couldn't be forcibly removed until Harry hit adulthood.
      • Did you read versions of The Order of the Phoenix and Deathly Hallows that were published in alternate timelines? Molly Weasley was trying to restrain the kids from going out on their adventures right up to the day the Great Horcrux Hunt began. The Weasleys were never "enabling" Harry's adventures; christ, they'd have pulled their legally of-age children from the Order if they'd been able to. As far as blood protections vs. the Fidelius Charm, where the hell did you get the idea that the blood protections work anywhere outside of Privet Drive? Dumbledore specifically says that they don't (in chapter 37 of "Order of the Phoenix"). And with the exception of the one instance at the end of Philosopher's Stone (where Voldemort was a highly weakened shade of himself and especially vulnerable), the protections never saved Harry from anything outside Privet Drive; Harry's been repeatedly stabbed, beaten up, hexed, cursed, bitten, and Crucio'ed, by either Voldemort himself or people carrying the Dark Mark, all the way through the damn series.
      • Molly did seem to treat Harry more extravagantly than Ron at times. But that's also attributable to him being a guest and her feeling sorry for him being an orphan.
      • Or how about the Flamels? They were good friends and colleagues of Dumbledore's, they'd been around for too many centuries to be impressed by some flash-in-the-pan Boy Who Lived, and they weren't British, meaning they probably only knew about Voldemort second-hand and wouldn't feel obligated to Harry for "saving" them.
    • "DD knew Death Eaters well enough to predict their every move". Weak bullshit. Ten years had passed, and people change.
      • Agreed here, Dumbledore was playing with fire. Draco's getting the DE into the castle in book six proves the falacy of such thinking.
    • "DD couldn't deal with the Basilisk because he didn't know Parseltongue". Bullshit. After the Duel Club, he knew that Harry can speak it.
      • Yes, but HE didn't know parsletongue. He might have suspected a basilisk but he had no way to verify it and Harry didn't mention to anyone but Harry and Hermione that he was hearing voices and they told him that was weird and to not tell people about it.
      • He (and Snape) both knew Legilemency. It's safe to assume that whatever Harry knows, they know. Why the hell else do you think they set up that Duelling Club? To confirm their suspicions, of course.
      • They don't just automatically know everything everyone else knows, they have to actually enter the minds of the person and locate the infomation. It's not exactly a subtle thing and Harry would have certainly realized something was up. I'm also fairly certain it requires eye contact and while Harry might maintain that with Dumbledore while feeling intruded upon he certainly would not have with Snape. Also, even if he knew it was a basilisk and he knew Harry wasa parsletongie, which everyone knew after the duelling club, there's still the matter of finding the Chamber of Secrets, figuring out how to open it witout being able to speak the language (and Dumbledore certainly wouldn't have brought Harry along at this point), figuring out who's controlling the basilisk and destroying the diary, assuming he even figured out what it was. Could Dumbledore have done that? Maybe, but it's not what happened.
      • " Harry would have certainly realized..." - You don't know that. "eye contact..." - yes, he did looked Snape in the eye every time the latter started telling him off for the next screw up. "...finding the Chamber of Secrets" - he knew where Mirtle died, from there on it's easy. Don't tell me he couldn't have found that snake on the washstand. "...certainly wouldn't have brought Harry along..." - why not? Everything else - I honestly don't see what all this has to do with killing the snake. Moreover, as I've already wrote in the CoS section, he could've used a Time Turner to return to the time of the attack and nail the snake right there and then.
      • Know how I can tell you that he couldn't have? Because he didn't. Dumbledore had almost all the infomation right in front of him for decades, and Harry likely wasn't the first Parseltongue to come through he school since Voldemort. Fact is, Dumbledore didn't know what was going on and Harry was told by the two people he trusted not to go around telling anyone about hearing voices and by the time he figured out what was going on and was ready to tell Dumbledore he'd been removed by Lucius. Maybe Dumbledore or Snape could have gone searching through Harry's mind for the information, maybe even without his knowledge but that's, again, not how things went down. We have no reason to believe either of them regularly invade their students' minds.
      • This is circular logic. You are saying he couldn't have done it because he didn't and that he didn't because he couldn't.
      • New possibility; even if we accept that Harry is only safe at Privet Drive or at Hogwarts, he could be given lodging at Hogwarts year-round. And before you go "No he couldn't!", two words: Sybill Trelawney. Dumbledore was able to declare that she could keep her year-round apartment at Hogwarts, as a guest of the school, even after Umbridge fired her from being Professor. So; find designated caregiver for Harry, give said caregiver a job at Hogwarts, give them year-round quarters as part of that job, and Harry (as their ward) lives with them. Sha-freaking-zam. Harry is now at Hogwarts the entire year. Hell, you could make Arabella Figg Harry's caretaker and then give her a job replacing Filch; now the Board of Governors can't even complain, because its not a make-work job, she's legitimately employed in a job that a squib has already been holding for decades. As for Filch? I'm sure his early retirement can be made a lot less stressful by Dumbledore sliding him a retirement bonus of 'ye olde huge sack of galleons' on the down-low.
      • Of course, that would require abolishing an important part of Hogwarts admittance policy, that is "let in every goddamned last associate of Voldemort who feels like it", and we don't know how the school board would take to that. Hogwarts has traditions, you know!
    • Everything about capturing Pettigrew, I already explained in the PoA section. In a nutshell: Pettigrew was exempt from the time loop, because his fate immediately after his escape was uncertain, and the timeline couldn't be possibly "messed with" thanks to being invariable.
      • Dumbledore is likely smart enough to realize that messing with time is a bad idea. He can send Harry and Hermione (both of whom have first hand knowledge of the vents in the area they needed to go to) because the're single minded enough to stick to the mission set for them. Dumbledore likely would have gotten distracted by the dozens of other little details he'd like to change. Plus it's possible he spotted them on his way to Hagrid's, we don't see that part from his perspective so he may have known. And they may be able to tell who's used the Time Turner. That one was for Hermione and nobody else, the Ministry likely would have be very upset that Dumbledore was using it to accomplish his own agenda.
      • Nope, saying "time travel is dangerous" for the seventeenth time didn't make it any more convincing. "Dumbledore likely would have gotten distracted..." - that's just lame. " accomplish his own agenda..." - since when is saving an innocent from death and capturing an escaped murderer is seen as "his own agenda"? Again, much elaborated on in the relative section.
      • Explain to me how time travel is not dangerous, nor the consequences of being discovered altering time? Time travel works in stable time loops anyway, he didn't go back and do it himself because that's not what happened the first time, whether he knew that or not.
      • How can you say that's not what happened the first time, if nobody knows what exactly happened?
      • Because it's obviously safe enough to give a time-travel device to a 14-year-old girl with only the instructions "Don't let anyone else see you, including your past self." I'm going to make an assumption that Dumbledore is more careful and is even more skillful than 14-year-old Hermione at sneaking around unseen. Being in the late evening/night, there were HUGE areas and times that Dumbledore himself could have stepped in to ensure that Pettigrew was captured without disrupting anything. There's an obvious "open ended" region after Harry and Hermione lost sight of Peter and went to take care of Harry and Sirius instead that Dumbledore could have stepped in.
      • They gave time travel to a 14 year old girl so she could do extra homework, under the supervision of the teachers. If she'd been caught using the time turner for personal reasons or let anyone else use it it would hve ben take away from her. Her having it at all was solely due to Minerva's persistence and even that took a while.
    • On the Triwizard Tournament. Yes, DD obviously arranged for the sake of Harry's training, because the alternative would be that he wasn't able to keep an eye on the Goblet while a former Death Eater (Karkarov) was in the school and didn't manage to root the culprit out of a handful of suspects (only a powerful mage could Confound the Goblet, how many of those were present?). Not to mention, of course, the utter ridiculousness of an idea of a "binding magical contact" without any emergency loopholes for a junior sport event. And last, but not least, the Return Portkey. Who the fuck else could've fit the Goblet with it if not DD? Crouch definitely didn't need to do that.
      • Karkarov sold out the Death Eaters in order to avoid prison, and even if he personally and single-handedly kidnapped Harry and resurrected Voldemort, Voldy still would have tortured him to death. Besides, even if Dumbledore had several suspects, he probably wouldn't have thought that his good friend of many years and professional baddass Mad-Eye Moody could be a traitor.
      • Or he arranged the Triwizard Tourneamnet to solidify Hogwart's allegence with the other two schools. He knew Voldemort was growing in strength and a return was inevitable so he reached out to the wizarding world outside his immediate influence. He seemed fairly upset that Harry was entered into the tournament at all and the spells he learned were either from coursework from that year or from basic research from Hermione, easily achived without putting Harry in repeated danger. He may have even been willing to help Harry train (though that is actually cheating, though at least basic cheating seems to be accepted as tradition) but Harry never seeks help from ay of the teachers so they all just assumed he figured out what he needed on his own. Fake Moody even tried to help indirectly but failed because Harry refused to ask for help outside Ron and Hermione.
      • Again, the idea of a "binding magic contract" without escape clauses for a junior competition is ridiculous. For Lenin's sake, it's not some grand trial with the fates of the universe at stake - it's an ordinary inter-colledge dick-measuring contest! What if some of the contestants is badly injured (Dobby, you have a chance to save Master Harry!), or if they cheat and must be disqualified, or if their relative suddenly falls ill or dies? There are countless possibilities, yet nobody attempts to test the contract's boundaries by suggesting, for instance, that Harry just seats the Tournament through and loses, nobody does anything to bail him out. As usual, it's not about whether it would work or not - it's about the mind-boggling absense of effort, which to me has only one explanation - the staff (read: DD) were interested and involved in Harry's participation. But even if we give the accused party all the benefit of the doubt in the world, it will not eliminate the grand question, that all DD advocates have so far avoided: who could've put the return portkey on the Goblet, if not DD?
      • That's because the answer is STUPIDLY easy to figure out: NOWHERE, in the ENTIRE SERIES, does it EVER say that touch-activated portkeys are one-way.
      • 1. Can you name any reason why they should behave differently from the time-activated ones, which ARE one-way? 2. If that was the case, you'd think Crouch and/or V would've taken special precautions to make sure Harry doesn't grab the Goblet right after appearing at the cemetery or Summons it once shit hits the fan...oh right, I forgot, "V is very vain". 3. If that was the case Goblet would've brought Harry back to the center of the labyrinth, not outside.
      • Presumably the "binding magical contract" effect wasn't something whipped up just for the Triwizard Tournament: it's most likely an effect that's used for all sorts of wizarding-world contracts. It's designed to be unbreakable because that's how they prevent people from breaking other sorts of crucial contractual agreements, not because a junior athletic competition is all that important.
      • If that was the case, there wouldn't be the need for the specific Unbreakable Vow. But regardless, just because a contract is unbreakable, doesn't mean it cannot have legitimate escape or termination clauses, and a contract for a teenager to enter a dangerous competition should obviously have those.
      • Maybe DD was keeping an eye on the tournament in general and the Goblet in particular. He might have even gone so far as to get an old auror with a particular knack for seeing things out of retirement just so he's got extra security around. As for the return portkey, the book makes it clear that it brought him outside the maze, supporting the "the cup was always a portkey and Crouch simply added an extra stop" theory.
      • If that was the case, Crouch would've known that, meaning V would've taken precautions to make sure Harry doesn't grab the Goblet right after appearing at the cemetery or Summons it once shit hits the fan. Also, if you can make a Portkey with a non-identifiable middle stop, it means you can make a non-identifiable Portkey, meaning that the only reason why Crouch would have to wait until the third task is void.

Ok, seriously, Dumbledore is not a bad guy. He is manipulative because he has to be, an occupational hazard of fighting Voldemort.
  • He leaves Harry with the Durselys because he believes it to be the best option. Fidelius Charms are breakable, the blood magic is not. There is absolutely 0% chance of a DE or Voldy hurting Harry while he is at the Dursley's. To Dumbledore that comes first, he has to get Harry to safety. The side effect of him growing up normal is good too. He knew Harry was abused, but he had good reasons for his plan and wasn't going to change them for Harry's comfort. Bear in mind the Dursleys never seem to have hit him or anything serious like that.
    • Yeah, i guess swinging a cast-iron frying pan at a 13-year-old doesn't count as child abuse as long as you miss.
    • Let's not forget that Uncle Vernon tried to strangle him in Order of the Phoenix and it was Harry's magic that saved him.
    • Care to explain Dementor attack in The Order of the Phoenix?
      • Sure, Harry had a guard but he went off to get stolen cauldrons. Plus Harry wasn't in the house so its protection did not apply.
      • 1. Fletcher had nothing to do with the Wards whatsoever (BTW, choosing HIM as Harry's guard is another WTF moment, thanks for raising it). 2. This means the protection was completely useless, since Harry obviously didn't spend his whole life inside the house - he went to non-wiz school, for crying out loud!
    • Ok, see, this kind of pisses me off. 'change them for Harry's comfort'? What the fuck? Seriously. Harry was systematically and very thoroughly abused in horrifying ways. He was malnourished, given the absolute minimum of attention possible (wearing secondhand clothes from a kid five times his size, glasses never fixed/replaced, etc), and Petunia at least once tried to take a frying pan to his head. WHAT?! And Vernon was always grabbing him and shaking/throwing him around. It's entirely possible there was worse physical abuse that did not get 'seen' in the books, and even if there wasn't, emoional/mental/verbal abuse is EVERY bit as bad as physical. It just doesn't happen to leave nice, sympathy-getting visible marks. By not removing Harry from that house ASAP, Dumbledore was running the very, frighteningly real risk of breeding another Voldemort (or worse) instead of the 'Savior of the Wizarding World'.
      • This is just speculation, again, but I don't think the Dursleys were THAT abusive. The only reason I have to go on this is because Harry attended a Muggle school for quite a few years and there is no mention of the school getting involved. It is admittedly a stretch of logic, but it doesn't make sense that the social workers of Britain, or whatever they are called, would have missed truly serious abuse. As for emotional abuse, yeah that was going on, but so long as Harry's life wasn't being threatened Dumbledore must have felt it was better to keep him safe. I am willing to bet that Dumbledore probably felt uneasy about how bad the Durselys were, which is why part of the reason why he let the Weasleys take Harry so often. I doubt any Wizarding family could have offered the same protection, Dubledore did say that the blood ward weas the strongest magic available. As for the dementors, again speculation, but maybe the blood ward only applied to Voldemort and the Death Eaters, not Ministry-sent dementors. Fletcher as a guard is kinds lame, but they did it in shifts and I doubt Dumbledore thought something serious was going to happen with the blood ward keeping Voldemort and the Death Eaters at bay.
      • One word: Obliviate. That's what happens to non-magicals when they get involved in the affairs of wizards. I'm sure the teachers DID notice. There's no way in Hades they couldn't. All the signs were there. Then they "forgot" at DD's wand-point.
      • You have clearly never been abused yourself, nor known someone who was abused. And you also never read the books. The books made it VERY clear that Harry was abused, frequently and consistently. He was slapped into the cupboard ... and locked in ... for extended (unspecified) periods, his food intake was severely curtailed (anyone who thinks a piece of bread and cheese is a sufficient meal for a growing child is INSANE), and both Petunia and Vernon physically accosted him at *least* once each in the books (more, actually), not to mention Dudley and co's 'Harry hunting'. As for no one getting involved ... *snort* All Vernon and co had to do was keep any bruises where they could not be seen, and verbally terrorize Harry into never speaking of what went on in the house (which is a VERY common tactic used by abusers). Combine that with a few careful blandishments in the right ears if anyone *did* get suspicious, and it is entirely believable that Harry fell through the cracks of the system. I will grant you that the dementors are very much an iffy proposition where keeping them away from Privet Drive is concerned, but for god's sake ... all it would have taken is someone like Malfoy finding out where Harry lived, (and given his connections in the Ministry, he could have), and Harry would have been so much dead meat, because even if he could not approach Privet Drive, he could have VERY easily sweet-talked the Dursleys into bringing 'both their boys' to some other location. Especially if he promised to take Harry off their hands. And as for Privet Drive being the only safe place ... bullshit. If Dumbles had actually intervened on Sirius' behalf and made sure he got a trial, (and Sirius was cleared), Grimmauld Place, which was apparently unassailable in the later books, would have been perfectly fine as a living place. Better, Harry would have been with someone (two someones, in all likelihood, since I'd bet good money on Remus joining them) who loved him dearly. And even if you take Sirius out of the equation ... hello, Weasleys. Upgrade the defenses around the Burrow and put it under Fidelius (with bloody Dumbledore as Secret Keeper) and Harry'd be fine. Final point ... abuse (physical or otherwise) leaves scars. Depending on the severity of the abuse and the personality of the one being abused, the damage can be as 'minimal' (hah!) as a lifetime struggle with low self-esteem and as horrifying as suicidal depression, anxiety/panic attacks, any of a number of crippling phobias, night terrors and more. Given what Harry was going to be expected to do (defeat Voldie), putting him, knowingly, into a situation where he would be in danger of acquiring such problems is not only damn stupid, it's literally criminal.
    • Who says Dumbledore doesn't check up on the Dursleys and Obliviate Harry? It's not ideal, but shields Harry from the worst of any abuse and stops Death Eaters torturing him to death.
    • Refutation of two points above. First off, the only weakness in the Fidelius Charm is that the Secret Keeper might betray you. Since Dumbledore could use himself for the Secret Keeper, that's obviously not a problem for him! As far as 'there is no way to break the blood protections', that's wrong again; the blood protections only work so long as Harry is still living at Privet Drive. The instant Vernon or Petunia chucks him out permanently and not just temporarily, *poof*, its gone. And given that they didn't want him there anyway... let's just say that if, oh, Narcissa Malfoy had walked up to Vernon in his office at Grunnings one day and said 'Give Harry's custody over to me and I'll give you this huge sack of gold', Vernon would sign the paperwork so fast he'd break the pen. So, really, Dumbledore's blood protections are a pure Idiot Plot; he's an idiot for thinking they'd work, and the Death Eaters are total idiots for actually being so made of fail that in seventeen years they can't think of a plan that literally took me longer to type out than to compose in the first place.
      • "Give Harry's custody over to me and I'll give you this huge sack of gold" - or, even better, kidnap Dudley and promise Petunia to send him back home one piece at a time unless they renounce Harry. Same effect, but more fun!
      • Also, with the fidelius charm, only one person would know where Harry lived. Given that Umbridge was able to send Dementors after Harry, we can assume that the fact he was living at Privet Drive was public knowledge. Even if only a select few at the Ministry knew this, it would be simple for someone like Lucius to find Harry's location.
      • Perhaps Dumbledore did not want Harry to grow up under a Fidelius Charm. Think about it, if Harry was under a Fidelius Charm he would be unable to leave the house, just like James. Imagine a child being shut inside for their entire life. Seems like that would be worse than what we see the Durselys do. Moreover, none of the people caring for him would be able to lead normal lives either. I also think that Dumbledore understood that Petunia would never throw Harry out. When Vernon tried she told him point blank it wasn't going to happen. And he backed down.
      • In canon, Harry spent the first 11 years of his life being worked like a Malfoy house-elf, forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs, emotionally abused, deprived of food, occasional beatings, and never being allowed out anyway except for school and chores. Short of actually sticking him in Azkaban or handing him over to Death Eaters, there really isn't much of a worse place in Magical Britain to live than where Harry already is. 11 years in a safe house being raised by normal loving people might be a bit confining to us, but when the horizons of your world are a damned cupboard under the stairs its still a significant trade up. Also, you can Fidelius a pretty large building; Grimmauld Place ain't small. Doing it to, oh, a manor house and grounds, would allow Harry a better life than Privet Drive even if he could only go over the fence when accompanied by a guard and for short periods.
  • Voldemort is good at deception, that is why he hired Quirrel. He may have suspected Quirrel wanted to steal the Stone, but he had no proof and Quirrel had not done anything to make him suspect Voldemort's involvement. The obstacles may not have been on par with Voldy's cave, but Flamel still had to get to the Stone every now and again to get Elixer. Dumbledore had no idea Harry knew about the Stone and he certainly didn't set up the obstacles so Harry and co. could get past. It just happened that way so we could have a story.
    • Oh, sure. And all the obstacles just happened to be perfectly tailored to the kids' skills. And Hagrid just happened to blab out all the plot-related information. And DD just happened to be there when Harry was sitting at the mirror and explain exactly how it work. And of course DD didn't know that someone was killing unicorns or how they were being killed and what that implied...are you trying to persuade us or yourself?
      • Pretty much. Coincidences can happen. Dumbledore knew about the unicorns but what do you expect him to do about it? He still doesn't know who is doing it or who Voldemort may be possesing. I have to wonder about why Voldy did the unicorn blood, he wan't going to die without it, but that's another headscratcher. As for Hagrid blabbing, he blabbed to a stranger in a pub, it's not out of character. Dumbledore was at the mirror because he was waiting for Harry, that was why he was invisible. Why wouldn't he explain about the mirror, it kept Harry from searching for it again.
      • Just happened to be tailored to the kids? So Dumbledore forsaw that Hermione would read ahead about a rare and deadly plant and remember enough information to get them through? And he totally had Macgonnagal create a chess set because he knew Ron would be good at chess? Or the potions puzzle that only Hermione was able to solve, which assumed she would make it that far? And of course there was the huge mountain troll that Quirrel dispatched on his own and would have likely been too much for the kids. But of course Dumbledore knew exactly how Quirrel would disable it and that it would still be down by the time the kids got there. And he knew Hagrid would leak the information about Fluffy to the kids? Okay, that one might be plausible but that again would require the children to know about Fluffy in advance and even then it didn them no good.
      • "Coincidences can happen" - Indeed they can. So if, say, one of the obstacles just happened to require something they happened to be good at, that would've been a coincidence. But when all the obstacles, without a single exclusion relied on their very particular strengths...well, if you keep deluding yourself, there is really nothing I can do about it. Next, on the particular tasks. OMG, you're not even trying, are you? "DD forsaw that Hermione would read ahead about a rare and deadly plant..." - they are in a fucking school, and he's the thrice goddamn Headmaster. He can control what they read and know, especially in case of a knowledge-hog, like Hermie. Advise a book about that plant for outside reading and then put a question about it in some test, to be sure she got it. Done. "had Macgonnagal create a chess set because he knew Ron would be good at chess" - no, because he knew Ron was good at chess. They have portraits in the common rooms, meaning they know what the kids are doing in their spare time. "the potions puzzle that only Hermione was able to solve, which assumed she would make it that far" - if she solved, it it doesn't mean only she could solve it and besides, why the hell wouldn't she get that far? "...there was the huge mountain troll that Quirrel dispatched on his own" - you mean like the one they nailed in the bathroom? Besides, you've answered your own question - Quirrell was expected to deal with the troll. "And he knew Hagrid would leak the information about Fluffy to the kids" - nope, he told Hagrid to leak it. "that again would require the children to know about Fluffy" - uhuh, remember how a first-year girl managed to open the door leading to the invaluable artifact guarded by a vicious monster? Another coincidence, I guess. And then Hagrid just happened to give Harry a flute as a gift.
      • I always thought that the plant was meant for Neville, he just went yolo and almost managed to screw everything up.
      • The thing is that the Stone was moved and the obstacles set up long before Harry made his friends. Plus he would have to explain to the teachers setting them up why he wanted it that way and I doubt they would have approved. I may be using Occam's Razor on this one, but narrative convenience seems more likely to be at fault here. If the Stone had been as well guarded as Voldy's cave Harry would never have gotten to it.
      • First, there's no indication when exactly the traps were set up. Only Fluffy was in place originally. DD might've been adding the remaining obstacles as he learnt more about the kids. Second, the most obviously tailored obstacles (chess and puzzle) were set up by Mc Gonagal and Snape, who were in on the plan. Even if the others weren't, DD wouldn't need to explain anything, because he's the goddamn Dumbledore and everybody trusts him. Finally, yes, the default explanation is "All the characters are idiots, because it was easier for Rowling that way". I'm all for it, but I'm willing to give the accused the benefit of the doubt.
  • Dumbledore obviously was unsure what Slytherin's monster was. He may have suspected it was a Basilisk, but he had no way to know for sure. He also had no way to know that Parseltongue would get him into the Chamber. As for closing the school, there were no fatalities and the conditions were reversible. It would take multiple attacks, five in total, before they talked of shutting down the school. Remember the attacks were spaced over months.
    • Use a Time-Turner after the first attack, go to the place where it's about to take place, become imperceptible, wait for the killer, stop him. Done.
      • Nope. Doesn't work like that. It's a Stable Time Loop.
      • You Keep Using That Word. Care to elaborate in your own words how that particular plan wouldn't work? (Mind you, when I wrote "stop him" I obviously meant after it attacked Colin, so the precious Loop wouldn't suffer).
    • If he had caught the killer then and there he would never have gone back in time to catch the killer. Plus him presenting the killer would have meant he would have run into his past self. Since he didn't present the killer that means that if he had gone back in time he would have failed to catch the killer because that's what did happen. I also assume the Time Turners have some limit to how far back you can go (probably only a few hours). This leaves a relatively small window for learning about the attack and time traveling back to try to stop it. The last one is admittedly pure speculation on my part.
    • Moreover, DD obviously knew who the monster was. Otherwise why the hell would Hagrid advise Harry to follow the spiders? It meant Hagrid (and therefore DD) knew that the spiders were fleeing the castle, which, in conjunction with the methods of attacks and the slaughter of roosters gives a very clear picture. Oh, and add here Mirtle's bathroom mysteriously being left unrepaired for 50 years (right, they couldn't drive out a single stupid ghost, sure).
      • Hagrid told Harry and Ron to follow the spiders because they would lead them to Aragog, who could confirm that Hagrid really wasn't the Heir of Slytherin. While Aragog himself seemed to know what the monster was, he wouldn't tell Harry and Ron and he likely didn't tell Hagrid or Dumbledore either. The staff may have never even realized the spiders and roosters were related to the monster, and Basilisks are probably not the only magical creature that use petrification.
      • No, they really may not. Hagrid would have to know in advance that the spiders were fleeing the castle, and Aragog didn't hide their fright of the monster. As for the roosters, gimmeabrek. What kind of fox kills roosters but doesn't drag them away? And then there were writings on the wall in rooster blood, and don't tell me they couldn't tell it from human, that's not even funny. They also knew the monster belonged to Slytherin, who had a raging snake fetish, could petrify people and kill them without contact, probably with sight (how else?), and only Harry, a Parselmouth, could hear it inside the walls (Legilimancy). NO WAY they didn't know or at least had a very good guess what it was.
      • Hagrid says to follow the spiders because they lead to Aragog, who is the only person who knows what the monster is. Admittedly the chances of it telling Ron and Harry when it wouldn't even tell Hagrid are pretty slim, but Hagrid is always misjudging monsters. Also there's not much of a case for saying DD should have known all these things about the monster unless you assume that he mind reads his students fairly often. (Does anyone find it funny that the "Dumbledore is evil" supporters use the fact that he doesn'tviolate the mental privacy of his students as proof?)
      • Yes, but he had to know in advance spiders were fleeing the castle and again, how many monsters are there that terrify spiders? "All those things" amounted to Harry hearing its voice inside the pipes. Even if DD didn't read Harry's mind or had Severus do it (and I'm more than sure he did), the reamining clues are still galore.
      • Absent more comprehensive information about the Harry Potter world it is difficult to say for sure what Dumbledore must have deduced or not. Note that each person has their own worldview and what can be blazingly obvious to one person may be clear as mud to another. Also even if Dumbledore suspected the basilisk, what would he have done differently? As for Myrtle's bathroom, I've always felt that he let her haunt the place, seeing as she had no where else to go.
  • Why do people think Dumbledore would have done better if he had reversed time? He didn't live through the events. All he had was a hasty second hand account from Sirius. He could have easily botched something, been seen because he didn't know how events played out. Also wasn't Fudge expecting Dumbledore? Hard to hide your involvement when you are supposed to be following after the Minister and appear out ahead of him. Plus there is no evidence Dumbledore had any experience with a Time Turner, while Hermione had been sucessfully using one for a year.
    • Become invisible, follow the Trio, live through the events. Done. No, he couldn't, everything had already worked out fine. What kind of "experience" do you need to use the damned thing?
      • I doubt Dumbledore would actually follow the Trio around, first of all DD would sort of respect their privacy (yes I know - legilmency doesn't respect privacy but even DD wouldn't monitor their every move)and secondly - DD is, in effect, the unnoficial Minister for Magic. Throughout the books he appears to be holding Wizarding Britain together because Fudge is too incompetent to do so himself, he just doesn't have the time to trail three children!
      • Who says anything about trailing them all the time? He would only have to do it once and only for those few hours, and even that would be completely redundant, because he had not a "hasty second hand account from Sirius" but a perfect recollection of events. Three of them, actually.
      • Once again, Stable Time Loop.
      • Again, BS. Already elaborated in PoA section, and have so far yet to receive a sane answer (i.e. without heedless resort to tropes) why that wouldn't work.
      • The stable time line argument is thus: Dumbledore has seen enough clues throughout the evening (maybe Buckbeak's disappearance, and most especially Harry seeing his "Dad" drive away the dementors) to deduce that he was not the one who caused them. He figures out that it must have been Harry and Hermione because there is no one else and so he sends them back to do it.
      • If you have never used one before you have no practice at not being detected.
      • Who? Who in the nine circles of fuck was supposed to "detect" him, and how would avoiding that be any different from not being detected in normal course of events, which DD obviously can do very well.
      • I don't know... maybe advanced magical security around a high-valued prison who'd already escaped from an inescapable prison? If I was in charge of guarding Sirius, I'd add invisibility-detecting wards to the place I was keeping him. Besides, Dumbledore got sacked just a year ago. He's really not in a good position if it appears that he personally broke out a convicted felon using Headmaster's privileges.
      • I presume you mean "high-valued criminal", but... what does this have to do with anything? He wouldn't have to go anywhere near Sirius after he was captured, and it wasn't his job to break him out - it was the kids' one. Also, what protection? Two kids and a huge flying beast flew to his cell, blasted the window open, had a sweet talk and then he flew away, are you kidding me? Thank you for leading on to this another huge chunk of idiocy, by the way.
      • Maybe he figured that things were more or less under control and allowed Harry and Hermione to win something on their own for self-confidence? For that matter, is it possible that he DID go back in time and followed them around invisibly, but never did anything because it wasn't needed?
      • Er, you seem to miss the point. Yes, the kids did fine, he didn't need to interfere with their part - he was supposed to capture Pettegrew after they let him escape, thus aquitting Sirius and preventing V's return.
  • As for the tournament, I assume that the magically binding contract was just that, magically binding. It might have been made like that so Headmasters couldn't withdraw their champions if they thought the Goblet had made a bad choice. I don't know what would have happened had Harry failed to compete, but obviously the result was worse than letting Harry do so. As for the reversable Portkey, Voldemort was probably going to use that to send Harry's dead body back. This way his death would be attributed to an accident and no one would know Voldy was back. He couldn't be sure when exactly he would be able to do it, so it was set to activate on Harry's touch, alive or dead. As for the flash of triumph, read book 7.
    • "withdraw their champions ..." - forbid to do that by the rules. Done. Again, what if a champion is badly injured, or cheats, or their relative falls badly ill and requires their attendance? "I don't know what would have happened..." - that is the point. Your theory is ungrounded. "Voldemort was probably going to use that to send Harry's dead body back..." - 1. How was that better than having Harry dissappear without a trace? 2.If that was the case, then it'd only make sense to bring Harry back inside the mase, not to the stands.
      • I assume that bloody injuries would have resulted in a withdrawal if the damage could not be easily remedied, like how Pomfrey fixed up Diggory. Cheating I would assume would result in the judges giving you zero points. As for the relative, maybe they could reschedule the tasks. As for the Portkey, I'm reaching here, maybe the original cup would have teleported the winner to the stands. That way they wouldn't have to run the maze again in reverse. Just guessing here. Plus if Harry disappeared it would be suspicious to Dumbledore, where as if he dies during the tournament it is chalked up to natural causes.
      • Well? How are you supposed to withdraw a contestant when (s)he is under that horrible contract of vagueness? Again, I'm not saying that it couldn't be all bindy and unescapy, I'm saying that it's unlikely, and thus should've been at least addressed in the book. As for the Portkey, who do you think put the Portkey on the Goblet? Crauch!Moody, who else, who brought it into the labyrinth to begin with, and he obviously wouldn't want to hold to the original plan.
      • Maybe the magic in the magically binding contract only made you think it was unbreakable? A contract you cannot consider breakable even under duress is one you cannot break. It would explain why Maxime and Karkaroff (after some anger) ultimately decided to go with it and not to leave. I also think Crouch Jr. overlaid the portus already on the cup. The first touch takes you to Voldemort, then after he's done he grasps Harry's dead hand to the cup. He appears dead and it is blamed on the tournament, not Voldy.
      • I always assumed the Portkey was meant to take Voldemort to Hogwarts where Dumbledore was. Voldy planned on Harry dying in the graveyard, so if he went to Hogwarts directly after that, believing nobody would expect him to show up, use the element of surprise to Avada Kadavra Dumby, and then his two worst enemies are dead (meaning he wouldn't need the prophecy) and Voldy is free to take over the wizarding world.
      • Riiiiiiiiiight. Go with but a bunch of your least reliable goons, probably in a weakened state, to the domain of your arch-nemesis, where there will be dozens of other powerful wizards, and where you cannot apparate from should anything go wrong. Brilliant!
      • Actually there's some Fridge Brilliance in there: Voldy knew the first half of the prophecy. Specifically the part about "The one with the power to vanquish the dark lord." - He is under the impression that Harry Potter, and ONLY Harry Potter can defeat him. So why not go mass slaughtering at Hogwarts after offing the one person in the world who poses a threat to you is taken care of? (Note: Regardless of the accuracy of the prophecy, Voldy believed that it was infallable.) Even failing that: he has the 3 ingredients he needs for his rebirth at hand already should he die a second time. At this point he still has (almost) all of his horcruxes intact, and so death is a temporary setback.
      • Because V is only an idiot when the plot demands it. Other times he understands that, prophecy or not, there are powers even he has to reckon with. And a full stadium of wizards, lead by DD on his home turf is definitely one of those. And who says he'd be killed rather than overpowered and captured?
  • Dumbledore witholds information from Harry in book 5 for a number of reasons. Key among these is the fact that Voldy can know access Harry's mind. He is scared that if Voldy realizes he is giving Harry useful info, that Voldy will be tempted to possess Harry. He also still wants to protect Harry despite all he has been through, he loves him too much to add to his burden.
    • "...will be tempted to possess..." - As opposed to, say, possesing him just to make him kill himself? "...still wants to protect..." - uhuh, by withholding crucial information that will help him to stay alive. Brilliant!
      • It doesn't appear that possesion lets you make the person committ suicide. Voldemort posses Harry at the end of the book and he doesn't make Harry Avada Kedavra himself or something. It probably kills the possesor too, even if Voldy's Horcruxes would let him survive he probably doesn't want to go through that again. As for Dumbledore, he admits his desire to protect Harry wasn't rational and was at odds with his grand plan.
      • Given that Dumbledore flat-out says at the end of The Order of the Phoenix 'Sirius is dead and this whole mess happened because I didn't tell you what I should have told you at the start of this year, Harry', the point's moot. Even Dumbledore admits that he screwed up on this one, so how can we argue it?
      • Mostly because even his "explanation" doesn't make any sense. "Oh, Harry. I cannot possibly ruin your pleasant ignorance and shoulder this terrible burden on you by telling you that some half-crazed crow you have no respect for had made a prophecy Riddle'd totally fell for thus becoming even more predictable and vulnerable, and that you don't have to fall for, because only you should rule your destiny, as i'm gonna belatedly explain to you the next year when I finally run out of stupid pills. Instead I'll leave you in the dark, seathing with impotent rage, guilt you must be feeling for inadvertently causing Sedrick's death and assisting in Voldemort's ressurection, and frustration over your friends and mentor all seemingly abandoning you. For the entire summer you will been eaten alive by insurmountable urge for action which I could use to teach you Occlumecy and other useful skills, but will instead completely waste, adding to your boredom and desperation! This is how precious you are to me - so precious I will completely disregard your feelings and show zero respect to you as a person!" Wow. That's...that's beyond simple senility. That's Insane Troll Logic!
      • I think Dumbledore would phrase it more like "Oh, Harry I cannot possibly add to your already weary mind by telling you that you somehow have to kill the greatest wizard of the age before he kills you because of a prophecy that he takes way too seriously. I'd prefer to give you time and space so that you can try to deal with your other emotional baggage before announcing that you were screwed from the beginning. I just wanted you to have as much of your childhood as you could before pushing you onto the front lines. That is how precious you are to me - so precious that I will risk the future of the Wizarding World and your opinion of me to try to spare you further pain." Yeah it's stupid, but understandable coming from a man who loved not too wisely but too well. This is the great mistake he refers to at the end of the book.
  • Dumbledore doesn't go after Draco because if he does Draco will be killed by the Death Eaters. He doesn't want that. He assigns Snape to help him try to curb Draco's admittedly pitiful attempts to commit homicide. He quarrels with Snape after Ron was poisoned because Snape was not doing his job well enough to keep students safe. Draco is admittedly very sheepish about murder, both attempts see him try to use Rosmerta to manipulte others into killing Dumbledore, Katie and Slughorn. I expect that if Draco had tried a bit harder Dumbledore would have stopped him.
    • "...Draco will be killed by the Death Eaters" - How? "Snape was not doing his job well enough..." - Snape obviously couldn't possibly tail Draco 24/7. "...if Draco had tried a bit harder..." - two people all but died, how much "harder" do you need?
      • They would kill Draco for failing. As for how, the usual. Snape was unable to win Draco's confidence, that was why Dumbledore reproached Snape for not keeping a closer eye on Draco. Bad choice of words on try harder. If he were more successful then.
      • "The usual" how? What V was gonna do, if DD, say, hid Draco under FC with himself as a Keeper? And the choice of words is still bad. Whad you mean "succeeded"? If Ron or that chick actually died? Well, then it's kinda late to stop him, don't you think?
      • What's Voldy going to do if Dumbledore takes Draco and hides him under Fidelius? Well, first off he's going to torture Draco's parents to death. Then he'll probably burn down Malfoy Manor, and maybe even target some of Draco's associates at Hogwarts. I think Dumbledore's thinking on Draco was that he sort of believed in the Death Eater cause but was finding himself doubting it, and had Dumbledore gotten through to Draco, then Draco would have willingly agreed to switch sides or at least give up, something which would not have occurred had Dumbledore simply stunned Draco and sent him to Azkaban to be released the next time the Death Eaters had a mass breakout (and yes, the Scrimgour administration would have done that if they'd known).
  • I have heard this one so often: "Snape or Dumbledore should have used Legilimency to read someone's mind and find out that they were up to no good." First of all, Legilimency can be resisted by skilled wizards, it is highly unlikely Crouch or Quirrel would have been affected. Second, Legilimency is extremely obvious when it is used and its effectiveness can be quashed by looking away. I doubt that would let it work on many students. Third it is probably illegal like the use of Veritaserum on students. Fourth and final, I doubt Snape and Dumbledore would poke around in the heads of everyone around them just in case. Legilimency is powerful, but limited. To be real effective you need to be able to incapacitate your opponent and force them to make eye contact with you, ala Voldemort and Gregorovich.
    • " extremely obvious when it is used...probably illegal...Snape and Dumbledore would poke need to be able to incapacitate your opponent..." - you don't know any of that.
      • I don't. I just make guesses based on what we do know. If Veritaserum is illegal on students why would Legilimency be legal? Harry certainly felt it when Snape or Voldemort tried it. If eye contact is crucial how do you plan to maintain it with an unsubdued opponent. Snape might poke around, judging on personality, but if Dumbledore didn't during books 1 and 2 I doubt he ever will.
      • Except that he did. When the teachers question Harry after they find Petrified Mrs. Norris, DD gives Harry a long look which makes the kid feel "X-rayed" (does it have to be any more obvious than that?) and then immediately declares his innocence.
      • There is a canon example of non-obvious legilimency; when Harry tries to get Snape to read his mind in Umbridge's office, because he needs to get a warning out about Sirius and can't talk out loud. Snape does pick up what Harry's trying to get across from his surface thoughts, but Harry ends the scene having absolutely no idea if Snape actually used Legilimency on him or not. Ergo; Snape is capable of subtlety as well as obvious mind rape. If he wants to be.
      • So Harry shouting that 'He's got Padfoot at the place where it's hidden!' had nothing to do with Snape knowing about the situation?
      • Even if Snape didn't read his mind then, V did later in the Ministery, and Scarhead didn't feel anything. And even if he would, what does it matter? If he doesn't know what the sensation of being scanned is, then he wouldn't be alarmed when it happens.
      • Irrelevant. Even if Dumbledore does know how to use Legilimency undetected, he wouldn't, because it's morally wrong. One of the sacrifices one makes to being a good guy, I suppose. (And yes, having Snape do it instead would be the same thing). Besides, if Harry realized this, he'd never have a reason to trust Dumbledore again, and it wouldn't have helped against any of the villains Dumbledore had the chance to use it on (Quirrell was presumably protected by Voldemort's occulmancy, he had no reason to mistrust Moody and JK Rowling has said that Barty Crouch Jr did have occulmancy as well, he already knew about Draco and didn't want to tip him off, it would have been useless against Umbridge or Lockhart).

  • IMO, Dumbledore was at best harmfully manipulative and at worst straight-up evil. 1) Bringing Harry to the Dursleys. He did this BEFORE Sirius went on his attempted Roaring Rampage of Revenge on Pettigrew. BEFORE. Which meant he had precisely zero authority over one Harry Potter unless he was named guardian in the Potters' wills, which I *sincerely* doubt, with Sirius being Harry's godfather. 2) From things revealed later in the book, Hagrid somehow managed to get to Godric's Hollow within minutes of the attack. HOW? He cannot use magic! How in the name of hell did Dumbledore even know the Potters had been attacked to send him? Sirius at least suspected because he couldn't find Pettigrew. For Hagrid to have gotten there that fast, Dumbledore would have had to have some sort of monitoring charm or some such ... AND a pre-made portkey to the cottage, which would kind of muck up the whole 'secret' thing if a bad guy managed to get hold of it! 3) The abuse. Arabella knew. She couldn't not. She SAW Harry regularly, admitted to his face she knew he was treated like shite. She reported to Dumbledore. He even admitted to knowing shit was bad at the Dursleys. 4) Back to Sirius, and spending over a decade locked in hell without benefit of a trial. I don't bloody well care if everyone was poison-sure he was guilty ... He. Was. Owed. A. Trial. And Dumbledore had the power and authority to insist on such, if not right then and there, then within a couple years, or what use were all his titles? 5) HOW many screwed-up teachers 'taught' in that school under Dumbledore's authority again? Quirrel - who taught at the school before, and Dumbledore somehow didn't, you know, notice the change in demeanor and decide to investigate? Lockhart. Whom he *knew* was a fraud. 'Moody', oh hells, 'Moody'. You mean to tell me Dumbledore never once suspected that this ... person ... wasn't the same as the friend he'd known for years? HAH. Umbridge. Ghods. Again with the having titles and authority and not, you know, using them. WTF. Also, Trelawney. Yeah, I get it. Seer who foresaw the end of the Dark Lord. *really* bad idea to let her run about loose, lest she get snapped up by a bad guy. That does not mean she MUST be a teacher. Binns. You're telling me they can't, you know, replace a ghost? Snape. I like the guy. He's got ... interesting depths. He is not, however, at all suitable to be teaching kids, at least the young ones. Keep him as the NEWT potions teacher and let someone with a more congenial disposition deal with the 'dunderheaded' youngsters. 6) While we're on the subject ... whose bright idea was it, again, to bring an item into a SCHOOL that was going to be attracting the attention of a maniacal, bloodthirsty, sociopathic monster who would NOT give a damn about killing everyone who got in his way?
    • "'Moody', oh hells, 'Moody'. You mean to tell me Dumbledore never once suspected that this ... person ... wasn't the same as the friend he'd known for years?" - Yes, he did not suspect Moody. because Crouch was just that damn good! Did you even read the book? "Umbridge. Ghods. Again with the having titles and authority and not, you know, using them. WTF." - Again... did you even read the book? Fudge took away his titles, Fudge wrote new laws to give Umbridge more power! What was Dumbledore supposed to do with Umbridge when the ministry, the law itself was used against him?
      • Have her fired for sadistically abusing children under her care, something that would have raised enough political stink that even Fudge would cut Umbridge loose to save his own skin. And before you say 'How could Dumbledore know she was doing it?', that's not the proper question — the proper question is 'What kind of idiot knows that a senior agent of someone who wishes his political destruction is walking around his school and doesn't have her watched?!? (As to what to watch her with? Portraits. Ghosts. Hogwarts house-elves. Monitoring charms. He's the world's most powerful wizard and she's a barely competent moron; there is no way he couldn't keep an eye on her in Hogwarts unless he simply never bloody tried.)
      • No, Fudge would have fought Umbridge's sacking with tooth and nail, and denied/dismissed any charges Dumbledore made against her regardless of the testimony of ghosts and portraits.
      • Which is still a net gain, because it means Fudge is using up political capital just playing catch-up that, in the absence of any effective action on your part, he would be free to spend elsewhere on making you even more miserable. And political capital is a finite resource. Not to mention, arguing for your subordinate's right to freely torture schoolchildren is a tough sell these days.
      • Besides, who cares about ghosts or portraits? They have the thrice goddamn Cloak of Invisibility! Just have someone, ANYONE accompany Harry to one of the "detentions" under it and BAM, Umbridge is gone, and they get enough blackmailing material to probably reinstate DD in all the offices he was kicked out of.
      • The argument seems to be centered around the idea that Dumbledore should have had Umbridge followed. The problem is that if Umbridge detects this it is going to ratchet up the Ministry's paranoia about Dumbledore even more. Dumbledore knew that once Voldy moved into the open he was going to need the Ministry's help. They are ultimately on the same side. Dumbledore was probably erring on the side of caution and trying not to unnecessarily provoke the Ministry. I think if he had known what Umbridge was doing he would have tried to stop her, but it doesn't appear that anyone brought it to his attention before he was kicked out. Once Umbridge was Headmistress there was little anyone could do to stop her.
      • The key word is "if" Umbridge detects it. Umbridge is an idiot who is at best an adequate wizard, and Dumbledore is his world's greatest living master of magic and in his own sanctum sanctorum besides. If he can't arrange a suitably discreet surveillance of her then he's just not trying at all. Goodness, the man has access to the most powerful invisibility artifact on Earth, a shapeshifter, and the ability to read minds.
      • Besides. "...that once Voldy moved into the open he was going to need the Ministry's help..." - no, he really, really wasn't. The Ministry's useless. He always knew that and he made sure Harry felt the same way.
      • While the Ministry is useless, that's a separate Headscratchers vs. Dumbledore — one, its largely Dumbledore's fault it ended up in that condition in the first place (see elsewhere on this page re: the 'political influence he wasted' argument) and two, even if it is mostly useless you still want it for yourself so Voldemort doesn't end up controlling it. As Voldemort did indeed end up controlling it in book 7, to the great inconvenience of, well, everyone. Of course, since catching the Minister's principal assistant red-handed in the act of torturing children would have been a great way of letting you put the screws on the Minister, Dumbledore's still missing an opportunity here re: Umbridge.

  • HBP: DD has a go at the Dursleys for torturing Harry. At the time I thought they were getting come-uppance for the years of abuse. DH: that Glory turned to ashes in my mouth, DD intended the Dursleys to torture Harry all along. Mrs Figg was DD's spy all the time.
    • There ain't no such animal as Blood-Wards. It is such a difficult spell because it don't exist. It don't protect against Dementors etc
      • Er, what? Hasn't it been discussed that the Blood-wards didn't protect Harry against Dementors in The Order of the Phoenix because he's nowhere NEAR his home, where the wards are?
      • Sure. The counter-question was how the hell were those wards supposed to be useful at all, since Harry obviously didn't spend his entire life inside the house.
    • Riddle is DD's man through and through. It was a vital part of DD's evil plan that Snape give Harry the info dump at that exact time and place. If Riddle had killed Snape 10 minutes earlier or 100 yards away, if Riddle had killed Snape quickly or stayed to watch Snape's death agony, DD's plan would have crashed and burned.
    • DD plans to ruin the education of countless generations by deliberately hiring The incompetent teachers. Binns, the man who can even make the Goblin Riots boring. Hagrid is a very competent Grounds-keeper, so DD sacks Grubbley Plank the competent Creatures teacher, The Order of the Phoenix: Umbridge sacks Trelawney for incompetence, DD stands on the Headmaster's right to let people live in the Castle. He could have done that from the beginning: Trelawney lives in the Castle and DD hires a competent teacher,
    • Upthread mentioned Snape's "insensitivity". WTF??? Snape deliberately intended to emotionally damage childern, Snape was sensitive enough to know exactly what tricks would hurt each student.
      • He didn't hire Binns. Binns was likely there back in the days of Dumbledore when he was a student there. And how do you fire a Ghost? He didn't fire Grubbly Plank, she was a sub, and Hagrid was a better teacher — he brought a young golden Unicorn so the boys could actually approach them, while Grubbly Planks couldn't. He tries making lessons fun, but Slytherin ruins it for him. Divinations is a pretty bad subject to begin with, and Dumbledore considered leaving the post empty. Firenze isn't much better of a teacher, because as is stated Divinations is more something you are born with than something you can actually learn.
      • You fire a ghost with an exorcism. Hell, if nothing else, you move the damn class to another classroom and hire a living professor to teach it. Let Binns be 'the ghost that lectures an empty room' for the rest of eternity. I mean, hell, we already know they just basically wrote off Moaning Myrtle's washroom, and it ain't like Hogwarts is short of classrooms.
    • Dumbledore explicitly didn't plan for Harry to be treated as badly as he was, though he never expected him to have a great time with the Dursleys. But he couldn't risk taking him away.
      • Right, which is why Harry had never left Dursley's home for a single minute and was personally transported by DD to and from Hogwarts every year and oh wait no that's not even remotely true, he'd been leaving it to go to the non-wiz school and such, and in every book he spent a significant amount of time away from it completely, and he was attacked by Dementors nearby, and he was physically hurt by Dursleys themselves inside the house, and the whole "blood protection" sharade is the stupidest thing this side of not using the Time Turners to solve crimes.

  • The whole scar-removal thing, assuming it's just a peice of tissue that's really Voldy's soul trying to get back...Okay, how would Dumbledore remove it short of cutting off a peice of Harry's flesh?
    • Yes, take a knife, cut out the scar,destroy the scar, Nurse heals the knife wound. It is the obvious solution, but it the untermensch Muggle solution. Also Dark Lord Broadcasting Network was an essential part of DD's plan and Harry's "death" is even more essential. DD does not hold the Idiot Ball, DD holds the Evil Ball. DD's plans must be evil.
      • There's no evidence that Voldemort's soul is only stuck on that piece of scar that it could be removed by cutting of the flesh. Sticking a knife there will just cause Harry unnecessary pain and damage. And souls don't reside only on a particular part of your body do they? If that were the case, how did Harry manage to gain Parselmouth abilities, when the soul is not on his lips, or ears?
    • But when would Dumbledore find the time to perform this? Stun Harry, cart him off to the hospital wing and do it?
      • You'd think that simply telling Harry 'I have found out that a piece of Voldemort's soul is stuck in your scar; fortunately Madam Pomfrey can surgically remove it' would have Harry running to the Hospital Wing under his own power, no 'carting' required.
      • The problem with these arguments is that removing Harry's scar is absolutely pointless. In the epilogue, it shows that Harry still have his scar even after defeating Voldemort. That's concrete, undeniable prove that Voldemort's soul is NOT attached to the scar. The scar simply symbolizes that.
      • are you aware that the locket, cup, and diary still existed after they were no longer horcruxes? Destroying a horcrux doesn't cause it to cease existence, it just stops it from having a soul attached to the mortal world through that object.
      • Healing magic cannot heal dark scars. I doubt removing it would make a difference either, as Dumbledore says Voldy's soul latched onto the only living being, not the scar.

  • DD is Light side of the Force, Riddle is Dark side. Both are evil like in the Star Wars prequels.
    • Depends on your definition of evil and if you reject the possibility of something in between.

  • Magnificent Bastard: Once you've come this far, it's settled. This title doesn't belong to Voldemort, it goes to none other than Albus Dumbledore himself. Directly and indirectly, intentionally and otherwise, this one man has been behind everything, everything, that has driven the history of the Potterverse from his time and even beyond, fitting every characteristic trope almost all the time.

  • It seems that the series is pretty much cut out to present that DE = Evil, those that fights against him = good. It's safe to assume that, while most of Dumbledore's method are questionable or even downright harmful, he's ultimately a good person who tries to make the world a better place (i.e. defeating Voldemort). Yes, he has flaws which endanger and infuriate people to no end, and those flaws should not, in any way, be ignored. But just because he's not a nice, omnipotent Big Good, doesn't mean he's a bad person.
    • I'd have to disagree on one crucial point. As I see it, V had already been defeated. He was an impotent shadow, and his only attempt at getting back to power was so pathetic, that it was used as practice for DD's pet student. The remains of V's legacy were dwindling and perfectly manageable through covert means. But that doesn't make for an exciting story or leave the designated hero much to do, does it? Show must go on, so this "ultimately good person", through brazen neglect or outright connivance, practically dragged V back from the grave, therefore being responsible for every single death that ensued. His methods were not just questionable, but insane, and his influence on his ward was devastating, and the only reason we got a happy ending is because Rowling had all the antagonists lobotomised with a chainsaw.
      • Dumbledore didn't have anything to do with Voldemort coming back from the grave. That was Pettigrew and Crouch, Jr.
      • No shift, it was. But unless somebody can present even a remotely plausible explanation for why didn't DD go back in time and captured Pettegrew, that doesn't include words "that's not the way it happened" or imply that the goddamn Dumbledore cannot catch a rat without getting seen, I sill call brazen neglect or outright connivance. And that's just Pettigrew. The sheer amount of utter bullshift (already pointed out both here and in the Goblet of Fire section, not going to repeat again) that goes on in GoF leaves no room for doubt: DD was in on the plan and went along with it.
      • Wait, what? It was flat-out stated in the book that time travel doesn't work like that. You can't go back and rewrite something that already happened. There was no way for Dumbledore to go back and stop Pettigrew. You're right, though, Dumbledore was in on the plan to stop Voldemort's tyranny and was the brains behind the plan that Harry used to save the wizarding world from oppression.
      • Care to indulge me with a direct quote of flat-out stating? I'll help you with the search. It should start something like this: "Harry, although I would wish nothing more, there's just absolutely no way for me to go back and capture Pettegrew after he escaped from you, because..."
      • "You're right, though, Dumbledore was in on the plan to stop Voldemort's tyranny..." Would you kindly restrain from juggling with my words? I meant Crouch's plan to kidnap the Scarhead in GoF, and you know it.
      • Also, while time travel does not allow you to undo anything that you already saw happen, our time-travellers in Po A only saw Pettigrew escape from them and scamper out of sight. They did not follow Pettigrew all the way back to Voldemort. So, even the Time-Turner's limitations don't prevent Dumbledore from going back himself, waiting until Pettigrew is out of line-of-sight of the past-time Harry et al, and then shoving a stunner so far up Peter's ass that it comes out his nose.
      • Correction: with time-travel "anything that you already saw happen" is no longer a valid criteria of what you can and cannot do in the past, because what you saw happen is already the product of interference (if any) from time travel. Cause and effect relation is no longer chronologically liniar, and future shapes the past. Therefore there has to be a justification, why the future allowed such past to exist, i.e. why DD allowed Pettegrew to escape, which does not involve the past events, because they have not happened yet.
      • Reminder that possessing magic does not make one omnipotent. Dumbledore does have limits on what he can do. It may have been less Dumbledore not letting Pettigrew escape and Dumbledore being unable to prevent Pettigrew from escaping. As we do not have the story from Dumbledore's perspective it is entirely possible that he realized he did not interfere in the time stream. Since he did not it means he could not. He may have only allowed Harry and Hermione to go back because he realized from Buckbeak's escape and the dementors being driven away that Harry was the one who did go back so he had to be the one to go back to keep the time line intact.
      • While Dumbledore does indeed have finite limits on his magic, the problem of detaining and subduing Peter Pettigrew while avoiding notice is trivially within his abilities. The question then lies on whether or not Dumbledore can be reasonably faulted for failure to fully understand the nature and limitations of time-turners and how they can potentially be exploited. I lean towards "yes, he can be", for two reasons. First off, Dumbledore is the greatest magical genius in Magical Britain — unless the problem is literally beyond all human ability, he should be the one to figure it out if anyone is (and of course it is not, as its a logical puzzle that simple armchair Internet debaters have figured out). And more importantly, Dumbledore is ultimately the person responsible for the decision to entrust a time-turner to a thirteen-year-old girl on campus, which means he damn well ought to have a thorough understanding of how time-turners work and corner cases by which they can be potentially abused... as that's necessary information for a risk evaluation on "is it safe to let Hermione have one of these things to play with?", a question that Dumbledore is hilariously negligent if he hasn't already asked it and answered it before giving Hermione that time-turner at all.
    • Now, if he'd really wanted to make that wretched pit a better place, a good start would've been to get over his youth complexes, assume command instead of the imbecile they've got and introduce some reforms long due, such as discontinuing the practice of feeding people to the embodiments of depression, turning their law enforcement unit into something at least remotely approaching an effective force, and, if we get totally wild here, maybe doing something about that whole "treating their neighbors as sub-human savages" thing that was going on.
      • The death of a family member that you may or may not have been directly responsible for isn't something you just "get over". It"s emotionally traumatizing. Furthermore, Dumbledore intentionally did not seek out a higher position because he was terrified that he would abuse the power like he did in his younger days. Furthermore, the wizarding system was incredibly corrupt. A lot of the people in Azcaban got sent there without a trial and the ones that did got a Kangaroo Court. However influential Dumbledore was, he was still one guy who couldn't be everywhere at once. Blaming the entire situation on Dumbledore is just absurd.
      • But...I thought Dumbledore was the wizarding system: Supreme Mugwump, leader of the ICW, etc. He's essentially the leader of the wizarding equivalent of the supreme court, but goes, "Poor me. I'm just a lowly headmaster" whenever someone suggests that something proactive be done. If he's not evil, he's complacent, and should instead be working towards putting someone "light" and compotent into those jobs.
      • It is specifically mentioned in book 1 that Minister Fudge continually sought Dumbledore's advice on everything to the point of 'wearing out his owl', and had ever since he'd taken office. Unless you are talking only about a period of time from book 4 and onwards, which is when Dumbledore finally loses his political influence with the Minister, Dumbledore cannot legitimately plead lack of power to change things. As previously mentioned he holds several important offices in his own right, and for a period of at least 11 years after Voldemort's apparent death Dumbledore also had massive influence with the office of the only person capable of politically blocking him.
    • Agreed, Dumbledore is more the Big Good than evil incarnate. He has his flaws, but that makes him three-dimensional and human, rather than a carboard cut-out.
  • After reading all this stuff, this is my current assessment of the man: I refuse to believe Dumbledore is flat-out malicious. You all bring up great evidence that his actions are immensely warped and do a ton of harm. But I refuse, REFUSE, to interpret this as him actually having malevolent or cruel motives. A crazy old man who has really, really twisted plans and consistently makes bad decisions without properly thinking them through? Fine. But the books are very clear that he is motivated by a desire to accomplish good ends. It doesn't excuse his laundry list of atrocious mistakes, but this is precisely why I find him such a compelling character. Dumbledore is not your one-note badass wizard advisor figure: Deathly Hallows' revelations gave him immense layers beyond that cliche. He's deconstructing that archetype, folks. So even though he may have been horribly flawed and done lots of damage in the pursuit of a good goal, we should be grateful for how complex and interesting Dumbledore is, not hating the character just because there's a HUGE number of morally gray actions by him.
  • I don't know if this has been answered anywhere (because it involves reading terabytes of text) so please delete this if it has but what would have been Dumbledore's plan to stop Voldemort if he never managed return to power during Harry's seven years at Hogwarts? lets just say for example that the real Moody managed to fight off Crouch Jr. Would we all be so willing to forgive Dumbledore for his actions if he tried to widow Ginny and half-orphan Harry's children?
    • Exactly what ended up happening in books 3-4. DD ensured that V would return to power, first by letting Pettegrew escape and then by allowing the asinine abdubtion plan to proceed without a hitch.
      • Or, maybe, his failures to stop Pettigrew and Voldy were actual failures? Just because something happens that someone could theoretically stop doesn't mean that that person was behind/wanted it. Incompetence is far more common than malice.
      • Entirely true, but incompetence can still be criticized even in the absence of deliberate malice. And given the death toll ultimately resulting from Dumbledore's incompetence here, it should be criticized.
      • It was a lousy rat against the goddamn Dumbledore armed with a time machine. There was no room for failure. You could just as well argue that someone failed to brush their teeth in the morning rather than decided not to do it. And if you do, you cannot then have that same person plan the most complicated gambit in the history of ever with the fate of the whole country (if not the world) hanging in balance, and expect anyone to take it seriously, let alone blindly trust that person.

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