What I Did For Love: Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore analysis, 1/3
Muffins! Muffins did not happen. They probably will, now that I've remembered you can substitute 3/4 cup water for 1 cup milk. Instead, this is the first in a series of three essays on really screwed-up things Dumbledore does in Harry Potter that make absolutely no sense. All of them are connected by his excuses, which is that it’s done “for love.”
The first mistake: Dumbledore leaves the young and newly orphaned child with his aunt, uncle, and cousin, the Dursleys. Dumbledore already knows these are awful people; it’s one of the first things we learn about both of them. J. K. Rowling goes out of her way, actually, to showcase the prejudice, lack of perspective, and xenophobia of Harry’s new family. Petunia turns against her own sister from the beginning and hates her nephew for Lily’s perceived crimes. Vernon hates Harry because he’s “one of those weirdos,” as he often repeats in one form or another. Both of Dudley’s parents teach him to hate Harry because they do, though he eventually manages to break free from this at the very end of the entire series (after which it is assumed they never meet again).
For essentially the entirety of his childhood, Harry lives in a cupboard under the stairs. We’re told that he’s locked in for days, in at least one case weeks, at a time; that during these periods, he often goes without meals; that the neighbors and other family members are told he attends St. Brutus’ Secure Centre for Incurably Criminal Boys, which practices corporal punishment for the smallest of infractions; and that he’s been treated as a dangerous influence for as long as he’s lived on No 4, Privet Drive, to the extent that he has no friends whatsoever. The Dursleys are incredibly abusive in a variety of physical, psychological, and emotional ways, and this is the home Harry escapes to attend Hogwarts.
Eventually, we learn there is a reason for Dumbledore imprisoning him in this way. The blood connection Petunia had with Lily works with Lily’s sacrifice for Harry’s sake to keep him protected against Voldemort for as long as he lives there. If he’d been allowed to, say, move in with the Weasleys, or to stay at Hogwarts or with Dumbledore himself (“the most powerful wizard of the age”), he wouldn’t have been protected enough.
Okay. Well, we also learn, in book five, that almost all the pure-blood families are connected to each other by blood. Blood is apparently what is necessary to keep Harry protected from Voldemort and his Death Eaters (though it’s never quite made clear if the blood protection is because the Dursleys are Harry’s family, or if Lily’s sacrifice and thus Petunia’s blood specifically keeps Harry safe). So...nobody had any other relatives? James Potter, presumably, did not spring fully formed from the ground, and neither did Lily and Petunia themselves. It’s believable that the Evanses were dead when Lily died herself, but--they died very young. Lily died at twenty-one, and Petunia’s only two years older. If Voldemort went after them, why didn’t he go after Petunia herself?
James, according to the Harry Potter wiki, was a pureblood wizard, which means he probably had family all over the place--family that are never mentioned. Ever. Apparently his parents both died, like Lily’s, before 1981; but wizards are supposed to live longer lives than Muggles, so why is everyone dying so young?! So Harry can live with the Dursleys, and learn what it is to be abused and neglected by the people who are supposed to be taking care of him.
In theory, this allows him to empathize with the young Tom Riddle, who also grew up without his parents. Except the orphanage Tom grew up in seems to have no noted history of locking people away in cupboards and denying them both meals and acknowledgement as human beings. That’s all Harry. Tom seems to be evil essentially from his birth, as it is detailed that he does--something--to various children with whom he lives. But...I don’t know. Empathy is a necessary trait in any hero figure, but how much empathy do you want your teen abuse victim to have with another person with some sort of “bad childhood” who is also the villain of the entire magical world? Nobody else even acknowledges that he’s been in hell for more than the first half of his life.
The abuse Harry suffers at the hands of the Dursleys comes to an abrupt and complete end when he is contacted by Hogwarts; rather, he gets his own bedroom, though he’s still locked in and fed through a cat flap installed at the bottom of the door. Even so, Dumbledore apparently hasn’t bothered to check up on him in eleven years, just to make sure they weren’t doing what they actually were. He states that he expected them to be decent people, despite what McGonagall observes of them in a single day (and let me just say that if there was ever a more illogically ignored character than McGonagall other than Hermione Granger in any book ever written, I don’t know who it is), all of which is evidence to the contrary.
One of the reasons given for Harry’s incarceration is that any wizarding family would have treated Harry like a young prince, which might have caused him to grow up arrogant and Malfoy-like and thus useless for world-saving purposes. To combat this, I present to you Molly Weasley. Would she have raised Harry like anything other than another of her children? Would she have given him anything less than a model moral background and a decent education? I think not. Since all the pureblood families are, more or less, interrelated, it seems like this would have been the perfect solution--unless, of course, it is the direct connection between Lily’s sacrifice and Lily and Petunia’s shared blood that matters, and not just that he live with blood relatives of any sort. It’s never explicitly stated that this is the case.
The strangest part of all of this is how much these years of abuse are totally glossed over--that despite everything Harry is still shipped back there every summer without fail. No one bothers (DUMBLEDORE) to look into what he’s been suffering through, even when Hagrid realizes he doesn’t know anything about his parents and that the Dursleys are basically awful to him in that hut on the rock in the middle of nowhere. Everybody’s just like “oh, okay, you’re here now! Awesome. Good thing there’s no reason for you to have lots of psychological scarring. Have some friends and social interaction, which clearly you are accustomed to!” It’s still a children’s series when Harry and the Dursleys are first mentioned, but--some kinds of exaggeration are not charming.
I could go on longer, but this is already almost two pages.
The first mistake: Dumbledore leaves the young and newly orphaned child with his aunt, uncle, and cousin, the Dursleys. Dumbledore already knows these are awful people; it’s one of the first things we learn about both of them. J. K. Rowling goes out of her way, actually, to showcase the prejudice, lack of perspective, and xenophobia of Harry’s new family. Petunia turns against her own sister from the beginning and hates her nephew for Lily’s perceived crimes. Vernon hates Harry because he’s “one of those weirdos,” as he often repeats in one form or another. Both of Dudley’s parents teach him to hate Harry because they do, though he eventually manages to break free from this at the very end of the entire series (after which it is assumed they never meet again).
For essentially the entirety of his childhood, Harry lives in a cupboard under the stairs. We’re told that he’s locked in for days, in at least one case weeks, at a time; that during these periods, he often goes without meals; that the neighbors and other family members are told he attends St. Brutus’ Secure Centre for Incurably Criminal Boys, which practices corporal punishment for the smallest of infractions; and that he’s been treated as a dangerous influence for as long as he’s lived on No 4, Privet Drive, to the extent that he has no friends whatsoever. The Dursleys are incredibly abusive in a variety of physical, psychological, and emotional ways, and this is the home Harry escapes to attend Hogwarts.
Eventually, we learn there is a reason for Dumbledore imprisoning him in this way. The blood connection Petunia had with Lily works with Lily’s sacrifice for Harry’s sake to keep him protected against Voldemort for as long as he lives there. If he’d been allowed to, say, move in with the Weasleys, or to stay at Hogwarts or with Dumbledore himself (“the most powerful wizard of the age”), he wouldn’t have been protected enough.
Okay. Well, we also learn, in book five, that almost all the pure-blood families are connected to each other by blood. Blood is apparently what is necessary to keep Harry protected from Voldemort and his Death Eaters (though it’s never quite made clear if the blood protection is because the Dursleys are Harry’s family, or if Lily’s sacrifice and thus Petunia’s blood specifically keeps Harry safe). So...nobody had any other relatives? James Potter, presumably, did not spring fully formed from the ground, and neither did Lily and Petunia themselves. It’s believable that the Evanses were dead when Lily died herself, but--they died very young. Lily died at twenty-one, and Petunia’s only two years older. If Voldemort went after them, why didn’t he go after Petunia herself?
James, according to the Harry Potter wiki, was a pureblood wizard, which means he probably had family all over the place--family that are never mentioned. Ever. Apparently his parents both died, like Lily’s, before 1981; but wizards are supposed to live longer lives than Muggles, so why is everyone dying so young?! So Harry can live with the Dursleys, and learn what it is to be abused and neglected by the people who are supposed to be taking care of him.
In theory, this allows him to empathize with the young Tom Riddle, who also grew up without his parents. Except the orphanage Tom grew up in seems to have no noted history of locking people away in cupboards and denying them both meals and acknowledgement as human beings. That’s all Harry. Tom seems to be evil essentially from his birth, as it is detailed that he does--something--to various children with whom he lives. But...I don’t know. Empathy is a necessary trait in any hero figure, but how much empathy do you want your teen abuse victim to have with another person with some sort of “bad childhood” who is also the villain of the entire magical world? Nobody else even acknowledges that he’s been in hell for more than the first half of his life.
The abuse Harry suffers at the hands of the Dursleys comes to an abrupt and complete end when he is contacted by Hogwarts; rather, he gets his own bedroom, though he’s still locked in and fed through a cat flap installed at the bottom of the door. Even so, Dumbledore apparently hasn’t bothered to check up on him in eleven years, just to make sure they weren’t doing what they actually were. He states that he expected them to be decent people, despite what McGonagall observes of them in a single day (and let me just say that if there was ever a more illogically ignored character than McGonagall other than Hermione Granger in any book ever written, I don’t know who it is), all of which is evidence to the contrary.
One of the reasons given for Harry’s incarceration is that any wizarding family would have treated Harry like a young prince, which might have caused him to grow up arrogant and Malfoy-like and thus useless for world-saving purposes. To combat this, I present to you Molly Weasley. Would she have raised Harry like anything other than another of her children? Would she have given him anything less than a model moral background and a decent education? I think not. Since all the pureblood families are, more or less, interrelated, it seems like this would have been the perfect solution--unless, of course, it is the direct connection between Lily’s sacrifice and Lily and Petunia’s shared blood that matters, and not just that he live with blood relatives of any sort. It’s never explicitly stated that this is the case.
The strangest part of all of this is how much these years of abuse are totally glossed over--that despite everything Harry is still shipped back there every summer without fail. No one bothers (DUMBLEDORE) to look into what he’s been suffering through, even when Hagrid realizes he doesn’t know anything about his parents and that the Dursleys are basically awful to him in that hut on the rock in the middle of nowhere. Everybody’s just like “oh, okay, you’re here now! Awesome. Good thing there’s no reason for you to have lots of psychological scarring. Have some friends and social interaction, which clearly you are accustomed to!” It’s still a children’s series when Harry and the Dursleys are first mentioned, but--some kinds of exaggeration are not charming.
I could go on longer, but this is already almost two pages.