A is for Albus Dumbledore
Ok, let’s start this thing off right!
What on earth was up with Dumbledore? Like seriously. What was his deal? He is supposed to be in charge of keeping this entire school of children safe but he fails in every single way. Even though he is considered to be the wisest wizard of all time or whatever, his decision-making skills are definitely a little out of wack.
First of all, all his energy seems to be focused on just Harry. And given the circumstances, this is obviously how it’s going to be for all of the years that Harry is at Hogwarts. But should it have really happened that way? Where were his concerns for the rest of the school? Did he even know that other students were attending classes there?
I find it really hard to believe that he had Harry’s best interests at heart. He knew the whole history of Tom Riddle/Voldemort and yet he still allowed Harry to go about his young life without knowing and of that information. A lot of people will say that Harry was too young to know about it, but I disagree. If his existence was putting an entire school in danger then it was his right to know about it. Why didn’t Dumbledore tell Harry about the situation? Why did he give the task to Snape who clearly had no interest in the child from the beginning aside from the fact that he was Lily’s son. Then, of course, why would Harry believe anything that Snape would tell him? If someone treated me in such a way I would never believe anything that they had to say.
Another thing that I have a super major problem with, is the hiring of teachers. Quirrel I guess is understandable. He was a teacher at Hogwarts before he was possessed by Voldemort, so Dumbledore probably didn’t know that Quirrel had a head growing out of the back of him, sucking his life force. But what about Lockhart? Seriously? How did Dumbledore not see through all the BS there? It is so obvious that he was such a doofus. A wizard as smart and well respected as Dumbledore should have seen that. And if he did, why on earth would he hire Lockhart to be a teacher at the school?
Moving on to Remus: I love the character of Remus, and within the context of the third book, it makes sense that Dumbledore would hire him to teach Harry all that he needs in order to get through the trials he faces in that book, but that just brings me back to my first point: why wouldn’t Dumbledore take care of that himself?! He seriously makes me so angry. His priorities man…
Of course, there is also the issue of how Dumbledore runs the school in general. Detentions starting at 11 pm at night? Or running past midnight? Even magical parents should have been taking an issue with this. Won’t somebody think of the children?!?!
provided via giphy.com
I have to agree with you here. Dumbledore is a wise and brilliant man, but some of his approaches towards looking after his charges are highly questionable.
Cait @ Click’s Clan
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While reading the books I get so angry with him! Haha!
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It;s funny… I guess I never spent enough time REALLY thinking about it but yeah… he makes some pretty shit decisions!
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Haha i know! Its so infuriating
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I wondered if you would do avacadava (sp?), I like this much better. You are definitely going to make me look at this differently.
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Thats listed under U for unforgivable curses 😉 so it is coming!! Thanks for stopping by and reading
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Excellent
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Haha, this is brilliant! I know everyone loves Dumbledore but he seriously needed a kick up the ass at times. And as much as I do think he was fond of Harry, I also think his primary goal was beating Voldemort and if Harry didn’t make it out of it alive, well that wouldn’t have stopped him!
Debbie
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Thanks for your insights! I am surprised at how many people are on board with this. I was expecting a serious backlash for this letter, and a few others to come. I hope that the rest of the posts I’m worried about have the same response!
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Unfortunately, I know nothing about the Harry Potter series other than it’s immensely popular and it made Rowlings a boat load of money. I’m sure you’ll find a niche of Potter fans among the A2Zers without any problems. At least you’re making the challenge about something you enjoy which means your passions will shine through your posts. Keep it up and thanks for visiting my #AprilA2Z Art Sketching Through the Alphabet series featuring the letter “A” for angels yesterday! But, I noticed you didn’t vote in my BoTB portion of my post, was that an oversight or did you run out of time? Oh well, if you’d like to cast your vote for your favorite “Angel theme” song then I hope you’ll stop back in! Have a good afternoon and God bless!
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Oh I didn’t know there was a vote! I was at work while reading your post and stopped after the sketches sorry!
And I didn’t know much about HP at first either. I hadn’t seen any of the movies until about 6 months before the last one came out, and just read the books for the first time 2 years ago, so I was a little behind haha.
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Yahhhhh what a way to kick off!!! I was annoyed with Dumbledore from day one for leaving him with the Dursley’s, knowing that he was being mistreated and lived in a cupboard under the stairs!! Poor Harry!
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Totally!! There are a lot of fan posts that are condemn Dumbledore for leaving Harry there and then for every other adult in his life for not doing a single thing about it.
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I think Dumbledore is overrated haha. He is a terrible headmaster because yes he never really had the safety of the students in mind. I think he should have been upfront with Harry from the beginning. I agree with Snape in the sense that he basically raise him for slaughter.
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Since the Defense Against the Dark Arts position had the curse on it, maybe Dumbledore thought it would be fun to hire someone as silly as Gilderoy to at least get some amusement out of it. I love the books, but agree Dumblerdore can be frustrating with his Machiavellian maneuvers. He could have saved a lot of time by being straight with Harry from the beginning but then the books might not be as much fun.
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Hehe maybe! I saw a fanfic comic which had Dumbledore say “I hope Harry kills this one too” after he hires Lockhart haha!
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I tend to agree – largely – with Aberforth’s view of his brother Albus that he was an exceptional wizard, but a hugely flawed human being. One could question how someone like that came to be headmaster in charge of young wizards is a mystery. But the headmistress of my boarding school had a strong dislike of children, and she was in charge of a boarding school for the up to 12s.
Bunny and the Bloke
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Yes that statement by Aberforth is very true. Albus is undoubtedly a very powerful wizard but also deeply flawed – like any human. Thanks for stopping by!
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