You Disgust Me, Dumbledore!

[chocedric.livejournal.com]

Hello again.

In advance, I want to apologize for not putting this entry under the cut, but honestly, I don't know how to do so. I am a totally blind user and am venturing into the world of Livejournal by myself. Is there a way of doing it just by using key strokes? If there is, please let me know and I will gladly edit the post.

Anyway, on to my rant for today.

Albus Dumbledore absolutely disgusts me. I know I shouldn't get so worked up about fictional characters, but when I read a book, I get sucked into their world. Somehow, though, I don't think you guys will mind, for I've seen many rants from you over characters you hate, and I think that's all fine!

Anyway, one line Dumbledore said in Order of the Phoenix made me absolutely despise him on a second reading, because I finally got the full implications of what he was saying.

Here I am going to paraphrase because I don't remember the exact quote.

What did I care if many nameless, faceless people died as long as you were happy? he says to Harry.

and it's then that Cedric Diggory's fearful, vulnerable, and shocked face springs into my miond and will not leave.

In other words, Dumbledore doesn't seem to care about anyone as long as his brilliant plan works. It makes me sick! He never got past his "greater good" philosophy he shared with his ex-boyfriend. And a student under his care had died the year before, and he's implying he didn't care as long as Harry was safe!

I know I seem to care about Cedric's death more than any other in the books, and now, I'm going to tell you why.

Every other character, Lily, James, Fred, Dobby, Moody, Sirius, Remus, Tonks, even Colin, for God's sake, knew they might die in the fight against Voldemort. They all marched into battle knowing the stakes were high. Cedric, on the other hand, even to the last moment, had absolutely no freaking idea what was going on. No wonder he looked so afraid! And also, why did JKR have to rub it in with the description of how Cedric looked when he was lying dead? Usually, death is described as something peaceful. The person has their eyes closed and a peaceful expression upon their face. Not Cedric, however. Even though I'm totally blind, that image of Cedric with his eyes wide, wide open and that terrified expression upon his handsome face has given me nightmares for years. And what makes it worse was that all his family, friends, and girlfriend had to see him looking like that! No wonder Cho was on and on at Harry, asking him what he'd been through in his final moments!

And Dumbledore caused all that to happen! No one can tell me that he didn't know Moody wasn't Moody. If they were good friends for as long as the book implies they were, it's complete bullshit that Dumbles didn't see through Crouch Junior. You can't tell me he was that good of an actor. And because of this, a seventeen-year-old boy was brutally and viciously snatched away from all his loved ones. I hope Mr. Diggory yelled and screamed at the old, pathetic man for tearing apart his family.

Cedric's death shook me up so much that I have actually started something that will hopefully make a difference to victims of violence in reality. Walk for Lost Dreams has been going on for two years now. It takes place in May and is a two-mile walk to raise money for the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts located in Philadelphia, PA. Portraits are painted and given to families of loved ones who have been lost because of cowardly acts of violence. The money is raised so that more portraits can be made.

But anyway, that's the impact that Cedric's death had on me, and I still can't get the image of his blank, lifeless eyes out of my mind. And it's people like Dumbledore that shouldn't be allowed to make important decisions. They should be doing tiny, menial jobs like taking out the trash (no offense to people who really do that, I'm just saying it would be a better job for him to have rather than a job with full power).

To end this entry, oh mighty Dumbledore, I'm going to throw one of your famous lines right back in your face!

You disgust me, Dumbledore! You do not care, then, about the death of Cedric Diggory? He can die, as long as you have what you want?

Comments

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Oh, I could rant for hours about Dumbles. Not only is he utterly empathy-deprived and hasn't learned a thing, as you point out, he is also a manipulator, and as prejudiced in his own way as any of the people on the other side. And though he apologizes, he never actually repents.

An lj-cut can be made in the text by putting the following html code right before the part you want hidden:



and the code



at the end. You can replace the "Read more" inside the quotes with anything you want to show up as the link text. Hope this helps.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Ack! Sorry, the code vanished. Here it is - TAKE OUT THE * symbols. I put them in to make it show up.

<*lj-cut text="Read more"*>

<*/lj-cut*>

[majorjune.livejournal.com]

YOU WROTE: I know I shouldn't get so worked up about fictional characters, but when I read a book, I get sucked into their world.

As one should, with good literature! LOL


YOU WROTE: Usually, death is described as something peaceful. The person has their eyes closed and a peaceful expression upon their face.

No offense, but that description is usually only found in fiction.

Someone who dies suddenly usually still has their eyes open. Someone who dies painfully, whether by natural causes (such as a heart attack), by accident (such as falling down a flight of stairs), or by violence (murder or suicide), will not have a peaceful expression on their face.


YOU WROTE: No one can tell me that he didn't know Moody wasn't Moody.

If he didn't, then it definitely puts in question the claim regarding him being such a great wizard! LOL


YOU WROTE: Cedric's death shook me up so much that I have actually started something that will hopefully make a difference to victims of violence in reality. Walk for Lost Dreams has been going on for two years now. It takes place in May and is a two-mile walk to raise money for the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts located in Philadelphia, PA. Portraits are painted and given to families of loved ones who have been lost because of cowardly acts of violence. The money is raised so that more portraits can be made.

As someone who had a family member succumb to an act of violence, I thank you for your effort in this area.

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

"Someone who dies suddenly usually still has their eyes open. Someone who dies painfully, whether by natural causes (such as a heart attack), by accident (such as falling down a flight of stairs), or by violence (murder or suicide), will not have a peaceful expression on their face."

And here we go again with Rowling's twisting reality to sort her means in the books. Sort of like the assertion that only cowardly women die in childbirth, right? Or that you can be born good, and then no matter what you do, it will be good?

[darth-eldritch.livejournal.com]

I've heard it said that Dumbledore was worst than Voldemort.

And I agree.

[darth-eldritch.livejournal.com]

I was disgusted by how Cedric was treated, also.

[sunnyskywalker]

I think I would be fine with Dumbledore turning out to be almost totally lacking in empathy and in general a total failure as a mentor and not really that nice a person - if Rowling hadn't then brought him back on stage for one last "Dumbledore explains it all" session in which he's still painted as a pretty good guy who sometimes made mistakes like getting obsessed with the Hallows but ultimately still helped a lot and made Harry's success possible. It would have been quite interesting and in keeping with all the previous books for Dumbledore to have turned out to be not what he appeared at all. It would have made an interesting contrast to Snape, too. I think Rowling got her ideas muddled up at some point. She wanted Dumbledore to be the "epitome of goodness," as she once called him, but also sometimes she had plot ideas which wouldn't work if Dumbledore just did something sensible, like giving Harry Destroying Horcruxes for Dummies right at the beginning of year 6 instead of dragging the whole thing out and never telling him how to do it. Instead of finding legitimate reasons for Dumbledore not to tell certain things (like not actually knowing the answer), or for things to go wrong even after Dumbledore tells everything he knows, she just forged ahead, leaving those contradictions between what she said and what actually happened, which makes Dumbledore look awful.

As for Moody, I think Red Hen's idea that Dumbledore knew the real Moody was a hostage somewhere fits. (Link: Hostage to Misfortune) But as she points out, that means he did a terrible job trying to rescue him! He and Snape are Legilimenses and they have Veritaserum; couldn't they do better than that?

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

In fact, if Dumbledore was set up as twisted and evil, and Snape was allowed to be good (just by that same token) then the story could have been amazingly complex- it could have made the valuable and subtle point that the good guys aren't always the nice guys and the nice guys aren't always good! But then we learn that Snape really was a bastard whose only redeeming feature is falling in love with Lily, and that Dumbledore really is always right! WTF!!

[oryx_leucoryx]

I agree with you that The Great Twinkly One is disgusting. The wold of fiction has many better mentor figures.

If all goes according to plan, I hope to start a sporkage of GOF in January. I intend to include an attempt to analyze who knew what when as I go along. Possibly with alternative assumptions in mind.

So you subscribe to the idea that Albus expected that getting Harry involved in Voldemort's resurrection would give him extra protection?

[quorothorn.livejournal.com]

"Here I am going to paraphrase because I don't remember the exact quote.

What did I care if many nameless, faceless people died as long as you were happy? he says to Harry.

and it's then that Cedric Diggory's fearful, vulnerable, and shocked face springs into my miond and will not leave."

But the context of that quotation* is Dumbledore explaining his mistakes to Harry--he's criticizing himself with that sentence, that he cared too much about Harry to throw the burden of the prophecy on him when he had barely even hit puberty, to use him the way his plan demanded. He doesn't actually not care about what happened to Cedric--he cares a lot.

"No one can tell me that he didn't know Moody wasn't Moody."

But he didn't. There's no evidence that Dumbledore lied when he said he didn't realize that fake!Moody was fake until fake!Moody took Harry to his office after the Third Task.

"Walk for Lost Dreams has been going on for two years now. It takes place in May and is a two-mile walk to raise money for the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts located in Philadelphia, PA. Portraits are painted and given to families of loved ones who have been lost because of cowardly acts of violence. The money is raised so that more portraits can be made."

I like this idea: props.

* To provide the exact section: "I cared more for your happiness than your knowing the truth, more for your peace of mind than my plan, more for your life than the lives that might be lost if the plan failed. In other words, I acted exactly as Voldemort expects we fools who love to act. Is there a defense? I defy anyone who has watched you as I have--and I have watched you more closely than you can have imagined--not to want to save you more pain than you had already suffered. What did I care if numbers of nameless and faceless people and creatures were slaughtered in the vague future, if in the here and now you were alive, and well, and happy?"

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

But he didn't. There's no evidence that Dumbledore lied when he said he didn't realize that fake!Moody was fake until fake!Moody took Harry to his office after the Third Task.

Moody was an old friend. Either Dumbledore knew, or Crouch was an amazingly good actor for someone who'd spent almost thirteen years under Imperius locked away at home, or Dumbledore was criminally unobservant (especially since he knew Voldemort was trying something that year). Or Moody was simply so two-dimensional that anyone could have imitated him with no one telling the difference, but that's too easy.

To provide the exact section: "I cared more for your happiness than your knowing the truth, more for your peace of mind than my plan, more for your life than the lives that might be lost if the plan failed. In other words, I acted exactly as Voldemort expects we fools who love to act. Is there a defense? I defy anyone who has watched you as I have--and I have watched you more closely than you can have imagined--not to want to save you more pain than you had already suffered. What did I care if numbers of nameless and faceless people and creatures were slaughtered in the vague future, if in the here and now you were alive, and well, and happy?"

And that makes him a crap leader and a terrible headmaster. Seriously, he's saying "I'm partly responsible for your beloved godfather's death, but it's okay because I love you after having secretly watched you all your life without so much as lifting a finger to do anything about how the Dursleys raised you, and I put making you happy above actually defeating Voldemort."

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

As far as the lj-cut, you can use the HTML code, but first you have to make sure your text editor is set to HTML code, and not rich text. In the rich text editor, you can insert an lj-cut by highlighting the section you want under the cut, and clicking the lj-cut button (which you can find by mousing over it).

[the-bitter-word.livejournal.com]

Dumbledore's speech to the school about Cedric had me going WTF? Here a kid just died, and Dumbledore used his death as an excuse for a recruiting speech against Voldemort and yet another chance to rub up against Harry Potter. His speech was ineffective, too. It certainly fell upon skeptical ears at the Slytherin table, as Rowling was at pains to tell us. I don't think he had a lot of credibility with a large segment of the student population, and it wasn't just fear of Voldemort that caused this. It was probably because they knew he could care less about them.

As for caring for the well-being of followers or embracing love, I think there was little difference between Voldemort and Dumbledore. All Dumbledore cared about was his plan and assuring the personal loyalty of his chess pieces, assuring that they would follow his orders without question. He was willing to sacrifice others to achieve his goals, without giving others the truth about the reasons for their sacrifices, even when they asked, even when they proved themselves trustworthy. He preferred to keep his secrets and sense of superiority unchallenged.

For me, I always remember that Dumbledore and Granger served as mouthpieces for the author.

To create an LJ-cut, assuming you are using a QWERTY keyboard and not using the rich text editor, go to the place you want text to be truncated and type the less-than bracket symbol (capitalized comma key), type in lj-cut (l j hyphen cut, all together), then type the greater than bracket (capitalized period key). To end an LJ-cut, put a slash (lower-case question mark key) after the first carat symbol in the formulation above, so it's less-than slash lj-cut greater-than. Essentially, like all HTML, you want to enclose your tags inside brackets. I hope this makes sense.

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[oryx_leucoryx]

Dumbledore's speech to the school about Cedric had me going WTF? Here a kid just died, and Dumbledore used his death as an excuse for a recruiting speech against Voldemort and yet another chance to rub up against Harry Potter. His speech was ineffective, too. It certainly fell upon skeptical ears at the Slytherin table, as Rowling was at pains to tell us. I don't think he had a lot of credibility with a large segment of the student population, and it wasn't just fear of Voldemort that caused this. It was probably because they knew he could care less about them.

The speech was made an entire week after Cedric died. This may have contributed to the suspicions.

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

This would be all true, if Dumbledore was a character, and not just a plot device who does whatever plot demands.

[detritius.livejournal.com]

Sadly, by the end of the series, that was true for pretty much every person and thing in the books. I can't think of anyone who behaved as a character throughout DH, rather than as a plot vehicle.

[karentheunicorn.livejournal.com]

if Rowling hadn't then brought him back on stage for one last "Dumbledore explains it all" session in which he's still painted as a pretty good guy who sometimes made mistakes like getting obsessed with the Hallows but ultimately still helped a lot and made Harry's success possible.,

Yes, yes and yes.

JKR still pushes us the reader into Dumbledore waiting arms and to believe he is all good and she seems to react to the fans of Severus like...Snape-who? Who cares about Snape, he wasn't good or anything like Dumbledore.

Dumbledore told Severus you disgust me. Well fine DD, but how are you really any different, Double-D?

And we the reader are supposed to follow JKR the narrator in agreeing that even though DD did some screwed up kinda evil crap, we're still supposed to believe HE, Double-D is the good one compaired to Snape.

What pisses me off more is so many readers accept that it was okay Dumbledore never seemed to really have any concern for Snape. Snape seems to have become one of those nameless who could be dumped into the situation and setup for murder - not unlike Cedric

Especially after he has allowed Snape to follow the same tragic path that he himself did; being obsessed with something. DD's was the Hallows and Severus was Lily, but even with DD having suffered loss in Love he seems very incapable of showing any form of compassion or understanding.

It isn't just Harry he lead to the slaughterhouse, he kept Severus boxed up for years in the idea that Voldemort would return and Snape would be needed; at the moment of greatest regret and greef DD basicly put a rope around Snape and kept him. I really don't see Dumbledore as any different than Voldemort; Dumbledore would say Voldie knows how to use people but so does Double-D, don't kid yourself Double-D

...Oh, wait, Dumbledore and JKR, maybe they'll say I'm incorrect and certain fans will say the same thing.

Well, lets drag DD's famous line about caring for Harry out. But Instead of Dumbledore saying this to Harry. Lets imagine someone else saying it about another character, and lets even put her name in it...Yea, Lets give these words to Severus and see if they don't fit perfectly.

What did I care if numbers of nameless and faceless people and creatures were slaughtered in the vague future, if in the here and now Lily was alive, and well, and happy?"

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

I'd have much more understanding for Dumbledore if we were ever shown that he actually *learned* something morally from his mistakes, or shown an ounce of genuine repentance that made him actually change his ways. Choosing another version of the same abstract 'greater good' idea and continuing to ignore the effects of his decisions upon actual individuals doesn't count; it's the same thing under another name. At least Voldie had something of an excuse, in that clinical psychopaths are simply *incapable* of empathy.

It isn't just Harry he lead to the slaughterhouse, he kept Severus boxed up for years in the idea that Voldemort would return and Snape would be needed; at the moment of greatest regret and greef DD basicly put a rope around Snape and kept him.

Have you ever seen The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari? Severus seems like another poor Cesare to Dumbledore's Caligari.

Oh crap. Crossover fic calls.

Excellent!

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

You're quite right. Dumbledore is horrifying to me - and sometimes I wonder if he isn't meant to be. There seems, sometimes, to be a split in these books between what Rowling consciously meant to say and what she unconsciously conveyed. So that I see her portrait of Dumbledore as an indictment of an uncaring God who allows death and suffering in the world. Except, of course, that Dumbledore isn't God the Father. He's just some guy, and a fairly shallow guy, at that. Up until HBP (when I finally began to like him, since I thought a lot of his more outrageous statements were jokes - I was disabused of that notion by DH), Dumbledore had no personality to me at all. He was a distant and rather cliched figure; the wise and flamboyant old headmaster. Then in HBP (retrospectively) and DH, we found out what he was really like, and he's just awful. Arrogant, manipulative, cruel, and lacking in empathy. He has no business juding Snape, or anybody.

But you're more observant than I am - and so is my Mom. She disliked Dumbledore from SS/PS, because he endangered children he should have been protecting. She's a retired teacher, btw.

Re: Excellent!

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

Except, of course, that Dumbledore isn't God the Father. He's just some guy, and a fairly shallow guy, at that.

Well, God as depicted in the Tanakh is the kind of guy who'll make bets with Satan that he can screw with his loyal servant as much as possible and justifies it with "can you make a hippo?" so you can see where JKR might be getting it from. I'm starting to think that she solves the Euthyphro dilemma by simply accepting that God can arbitrarily decide morality to be whatever he wants, and applies that to her sub-creation.

Re: Excellent!

[majorjune.livejournal.com]

You're quite right. Dumbledore is horrifying to me - and sometimes I wonder if he isn't meant to be. There seems, sometimes, to be a split in these books between what Rowling consciously meant to say and what she unconsciously conveyed.

In Rowling's recent interview with Oprah Winfrey, it was quite interesting what she had to say -- or more pointedly, not say -- about her own father.

In a nutshell, she obviously does not have a good relationship with her father.

And I wonder if that colors her portrayal of the adult male characters in the series; even the supposedly uber-good Dumbledore ends up being a manipulative bastard.

Snape is always nasty, and even now in interviews Rowling doesn't give him his due.

Sirius Black and James Potter are first presented as wonderful heroes, but Rowling quickly shows them to really be self-centered, egotistical bullies.

Remus Lupin, Alistair Moody, and every single Minister of Magic is shown to be ineffectual.

Even Arthur Weasley, the ultimate "good father", is actually weak, ineffectual, and to put it bluntly, p-whipped by his wife.

The older Weasley boys, the ones who actually seem to have some brains and worthwhile careers, are almost invisible. The twins are clowns whose pranks are forms of bullying. Ron is just a wuss.

So when you look at all the male characters on the "good" side, Rowling actually displays what seems to be a fear of male power; the men are either invisible or ineffective, and the few who are powerful turn out to be assholes in one form or another.

And when it comes down to it, the males on the "evil" side don't fare any better at her hand and pen.

Re: Excellent!

[sunnyskywalker]

Yeah, I think she had contradictory ideas and never managed to sort them out. Dumbledore is the epitome of goodness, except for how he has to screw up majorly so Harry can learn something about how mentors have flaws and the world is tough like that, and he knows almost everything, but he can't know almost everything because then he'd mess up the plot and be responsible for not acting on what he knows... it's a mess.

[karentheunicorn.livejournal.com]

I agree that there was no need for graphic descriptions of voiding bowels, but there should have been something like you describe above to indicate that battle, and the subsequent deaths, aren't as sanitary and poetically romantic as Rowling described.

Don't even get me started on the death by poem.

The hand holding Harry thudded to the floor and Snape moved no more...

It...fricking...rhymes! (cries)

JKR!?? Whhyyyyyy!!! or more like darth Vaders Noooooooo!!

I want to bite something, just because of how utterly annoying that last line sounds!

And I have had arguments online about this last line before, some people think that damn thing is friggin beautiful or...something.

I don't know, it just gets my hackles up. Every time I read it the damn thing it frustrates me. WHY did she have to do a damn poem? I don't remember getting poetry when Dumbledore died or Sirius...well we did get a singing phoenix when DD died, but still.

Dumpledore thudded to the ground, and there were tears all around...

Sirius fell through the curtain of doom...Hay, Harry got a new broom!

And who uses the word thudded anymore! Why Thudded!? (arg!)

This line probably makes me the madest over everything in the whole damn series. And it's not that Snape has died ir is dieing, It's the shear cocky bullshit of the damn sentance. JKR trying to be poetic and it makes me feel like I'm being patronized.


And for whatever reason it makes me think of the childrens poem the ittsy bittsy spider. Maybe because I connect Snape with spiders but still...Arg!!

Can anyone tell I don't like that last line. I think I could have handled the whole thing better if she hadn't turned it into a poem ending.

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

Oh, I just CRINGED when I realized that she not only gave Snape a horrid, unnecessary and useless death, but that she wrote it to rhyme! Maybe she meant it to be touching or something, but it wasn't. It was just adding insult to injury.

[lissa2.livejournal.com]

Admit it! you only hate Dumbledore cause he's a poo pusher.

"What did I care if many nameless, faceless people died as long as you were happy?"
This sentence has always confused me, what "nameless faceless people" that died was he talking about? can someone please explain?
But why do you, Chocedric, connect this sentence with Cedric? Cedric was neither nameless nor faceless to Dumbledore before he (Cedric) died.

"No one can tell me that he didn't know Moody wasn't Moody"
Dubledore is "OMG the greatest smartest most powerful wizard evah!!!11!!1" when the plot needed him to be so and very clueless and incompetent (not recognizing fake!Moddy, hiring the charlatan Lockheart, allowing Snape to bully the students,allowing Dog!Sirius to enter Hogwarts, allowing Harry to grow up with abusive relatives, didn't teach the "wand alliance" rule to the Hogwarts students ...) when the plot needed him to be so.

It pisses me off that Percy was blamed and punished for not recognizing that Mr Crouch was under Imperius (sp?) while no one in canon ever questioned why "Mr teflon" didn't recognize fake!Moddy. Even though Dumbledore probably knew Moody (not that kind of "knew"...) a lot better than Percy ever knew his boss. And he had daily interaction with fake!Moddy for about a year!
He's a disgusting vile glob of hemorrhoids on the anus of fantasy/children's literature.

PS: I'm still waiting for an explanation from the one-hit-wonder for why he didn't:
1)Include the teaching of the "wand will change alliance in a fight" rule in the DADA lessons.
2)Didn't tell Harry that the Ravenclaw artifac was the lost diadem.

[oryx_leucoryx]

This sentence has always confused me, what "nameless faceless people" that died was he talking about? can someone please explain?
But why do you, Chocedric, connect this sentence with Cedric? Cedric was neither nameless nor faceless to Dumbledore before he (Cedric) died.


Taken literally there couldn't have been any nameless, faceless wizards to Albus - he was a teacher or headmaster to all of them for generations (except the handful that were homeschooled or attended school abroad). So either he meant the deaths of us people (the ones he calls Muggles) or he means the deaths of anyone outside his circle of supporters - Order members, teachers and his dwindling supporters at the Ministry and Wizengamot. And Cedric falls under this definition of nameless and faceless.