I mean you can believe whatever you want. I'm just pointing out that most of the common "proof" that he is manipulative and controlling Harry in some way or has some great plan usually isn't solid and has gaping holes in it if you think about it.

It's kind of like that whole Dumbledore sent Hagrid to bias Harry against Slytherin thing. I mean on the one hand I get where people are coming from. On the surface, it seems perfectly logical that the person who rescues you from your horrible home life and sweeps you away and into a magical world will be someone who can influence you. At the same time, Dumbledore was the one who went to get Tom, and Tom certainly didn't let Dumbledore's words sway him and was generally distrustful of Dumbledore. Dumbledore would know better than anyone that such a thing is hardly a certainty to gamble on.

The books go on to show the many parallels between him and Tom. The brother wands, the special service to the school awards, the sorting hat, etc. As Taure points out earlier in this thread, choice is a large part of these books and it is what differentiates Harry from Tom. Manipulation takes away that choice, and it seems to run counter to the running theme of the books.

 

I never said he was manipulative in any way! I said that he set up a well thought out trap, and that our main characters fucked it up. Trust me when I say that I hate the whole manipulative Dumbledore cliché.

 

Three things.

1. Dumbledore hiding the philosopher's stone in a school, in which the first line of defense is a door that was unlocked by a first year.

2. The Basilisk in the CoS. With Myrtle and the roosters dying. Dumbledore should have known better, especially with access to Myrtle for I don't know how many years. And I don't think he thought Aragog did it when Tom Riddle was the who reported Hagrid. Any reasonably suspicious man with Dumbledore's information should have continued to look into the death of Myrtle.

3. Letting Malfoy in the 6th book go around trying to kill him, irrespective of collateral damage. I understand the idea of letting people have choices, but if a choice has a significant chance of hurting others it doesn't seem right to let it happen.

 

Shhh, that was bad and you should feel bad.

 

I can see that someone is trying to get into the WbA. I suggest providing more than one sentences post to whatever thread (I can see four so far!) you've decided to grace of your presence if you want to stay long on this forum; especially when most of your post look like shit posting.

As per the thread subject, I don't feel like we have enough evidence of Dumbledore 'meddling' with Harry to call him manipulative. There are certainly strange coincidences, but at the same time Dumbledore has always seemed to care about the safety of his students, at least to me.

 

I think that he's about as manipulative as any other old man with influence whose used to getting his way and used to being almost always correct. That's not exactly a compliment, but I don't think that he had any bad intentions, barring the obvious of course, in his manipulations.

I think the biggest problem is that he started to believe his own hype and that he didn't see how family could willingly treat its own badly. Albus Dumbledore is arguably one of the single most powerful and most intelligent wizards to have ever lived, but he was so used to being right that he didn't listen when McGonagall said that the Dursleys were bad, even by Muggle standards.

 

I think the issue with people thinking of Albus as a great manipulator stems from a couple of things. Some of those things are from his actions in the books, some are from his lack of action, and a lot just from a general sense of if he wasn't manipulating events, he's incompetent.

Could Harry and the gang have survived if he hadn't left them the objects he did in book seven. That can definitely be considered a manipulation. Was his death a manipulation? Or the part about asking Severus to kill him? Did he have Severus kill him to help ensure Snape was made headmaster and still in the Dark Lord's good graces? Did he do it to save Malfoy? Could he have avoided it?

Albus told Harry that he didn't believe in the prophecy, but Voldermort did? Was he truthful? How much of what he said was truthful? Did he do enough to ensure Voldermort's downfall? Did he know the full extent of what Harry went through with the Dursley's? Do we know fully what happened at the Dursley's. Was there really no way for him to communicate with Harry 4th or 5th year when he could have been helpful? Was he really that benign and powerless that he couldn't find Quirrel, a Basilisk, chastise and get Snape to tell the truth in year 3, couldn't identify an imposter Moody, let a teach physically abuse students, and let a student attempt murder multiple times over the course of 6 years?

Albus is a completely unsatisfying character and I can understand how people can view him as manipulative, even though I just veiw him as an ineffectual leader. And having Harry name his kid Albus Severus just makes me want to vomit.

 

What is up with this debate? Its like Rita Skeeter influencing public opinion all over again, except this time in the real world. If nothing else DH managed to turn a nice, if slightly eccentric, wise grandfatherly figure into a 'manipulative old coot'.

Suddenly none of his actions seemed to be about protecting Harry but about the 'Greater Good'. Blaming Harry's and to a lesser extent the Wizarding world's problems on Dumbledore's 'manipulations' was on sale and people started buying and still are by the looks of it.

 

Dumbledore was perfectly aware that family isn't always kind, considering he knew who the Gaunts were, he knew how the Blacks treated Sirius and Andromeda, etc. He even knew about how the Dursleys treated Harry, he says as much during his visit with them in HBP.

So then why does he leave Harry there, without having a 'stern talk' with Petunia or whatever? To reinforce Lily's protection. Remember that Petunia needed to willingly accept Harry into her home, and any coercion Dumbledore applied could have made her decide not to. Her accepting Harry and giving him a home, however grudging and however abusive, has saved his life on numerous occasions, beginning with Philosopher's Stone when he (IIRC) isn't killed by Voldemort in the Forest and then manages to overcome Quirrell in the ending. That same protection was a large part of why he survived the AK in Deathly Hallows. Removing that protection from Harry, a protection that is arguably the only real advantage he has over Voldemort, would be tantamount to a death sentence, so I think Dumbledore was more right than you seem to think to leave Harry with the Dursleys.

 

The thing is you have to assume almost omniscience from Dumbledore's part to claim leaving Harry "to his fate" was a good move, and if you assume that, then pretty much every other move Dumbledore makes (eg. not moving against the Death Eaters strong enough after Voldemort's fall) seems very stupid. Or, you can say that Dumbledore didn't have that knowledge, and that leaving Harry with no contact was a dick move.

A bad choice doesn't become a good one even if in the end it leads to good result. That's called luck, not good judgment.

 

What do you mean 'to his fate'? Are you taking about leaving him with the Dursleys? Because he clearly was keeping tabs on the situation, as evidenced by the presence of Arabella Figg. And it doesn't take omnoscience for Dumbledore to work out how the protection works and how to reinforce it, just a good knowledge of advanced magic which we know he has.

 

To be honest Dumbledore in canon is manipulative, but that is to be expected of anyone whose word is treated like scripture (exaggeration of course). When you realise that your suggestions and comments, no matter how innocent, actually carry weight and consequences then you tend to analyse what you say and do. And so from there you can be labeled as manipulative without being so.

But of course how much of it is intentional and how far you take it is up to you. Is Dumbledore an old man that is succumbing to old age and thus his plans aren't as sane as they should be, or is Dumbledore someone who had everything planned out, constantly revising his plans as time and events unfolded? Though I do remember that Dumbledore has a throwaway line in GoF, where he mentions at the Yule ball about finding a room filled with chamber pots, which Harry remembers in OotP when Dobby shows him the RoR.

 

Dumbledore was perfectly aware that family isn't always kind, considering he knew who the Gaunts were, he knew how the Blacks treated Sirius and Andromeda, etc.

Allow me to rephrase what I meant by my earlier statement. The way I see it, Dumbledore had an idealized view of what family does for each other and he didn't believe that Lily's sister would treat her nephew so badly (seriously, forcing a kid to live in a cupboard is child abuse by any standard).

And, in regards to the blood protections, Dumbledore didn't need coercion to have Petunia take Harry in. What he could have done was, a few months after Petunia accepted Harry, check in on him and ensure that Petunia understood everything that Harry had gone through and that she should try and raise him as she would her own and periodically check in on the boy (if he didn't want to have Harry know of his heritage he could easily disguise himself from a kid, he's Dumbledore) to make sure that the boy is, even if not treated as a hero, is cared for like any normal child.

 

I have to ask, what do you mean by "ensure that Petunia understood everything that Harry gone through"? He hadn't gone through anything yet. I mean his parents died but at an age that he wouldn't (shouldn't) remember them. If anything Petunia should have been hit the hardest, considering it was her sister. She is told this via a letter and is also told to raise her nephew because she is his closest living relation, for his protection and somehow hers as well. (I say this because with the way Purebloods look down on muggles, I doubt they would think that they would get anything from killing or threatening a bunch of muggles, especially from their point of view they would do anything they could to distant themselves from muggle relatives.)

Of course we know that Lily and Petunia have a rather tense relationship, however Dumbledore wouldn't know this. Why would he concern himself over the relationship Lily Potter (Evans) has with her sister, until it was too late for him to find out.

Dumbledore also wouldn't check on Harry personally every few months, maybe every few years. Because 1) he is a very busy person with all his duties and responsibilities etc. 2) people would start getting suspicious that he keeps disappearing every few months, he can't use the same excuses everytime. 3) he has no reason to doubt Mrs. Figg's reports or observations on the boy. So if anything blame Mrs. Figg for not being observant enough or not caring enough to report that anytime the Dursley's go anywhere Harry is dumped with her, which all in all is not a very big thing.

 

Well iirc, Petunia wrote to Dumbledore asking him to come to Hogwarts. It wouldn't surprise me at all if Dumbledore kept tabs on some of his muggleborn students to varying degrees. He's that kind of guy.

Also he worked with both Lily and James in the Order. It's not a massive stretch to suggest he was aware of bad blood but, typically of Dumbledore, believed that love would win out in the end.

Which it kind of did.

 

While I can see Dumbledore being that type of guy to somewhat keep tabs on his muggle born students, and might know Lily's relation with sister. To me it would be more in passing and maybe making small talk. I don't think he would remember or even actively hear her talk about it, especially since during the majority of Lily and James's school career and later when they graduate he would concentrating of the war effort. So I doubt he would be able to recall properly and like you said his propensity to believe in the power of love would colour these recollections.

 

Honestly my interpretation of Dumbledore in the books was that often him being manipulative actually caused him to fuck up, he kept everything too close to his chest and often times it felt like Harry and his friends adventures were less part of a plan as fanfiction likes to theorise and more active subversions of his idea of what was going to happen.

Take the philosophers stone for example unlike most people I don't actually think that was a test for Harry I think it was a trap for Voldemort/Quirrel that Harry and his mates totally fucked up.

So in response to the question I'd say it's like this: Dumbledore is manipulative in the sense that he tries to control situations but if anything his plans are unable to account for the impulsive actions of actual people which is probabley why he keeps most of his plans close to his chest which ironically only makes it more likely that people like Harry will accidentally cock things up.

 

My interpretation of Canon Dumbledore was that he was fundamentally someone who simply wanted to teach. Meaning he did not want to be in charge of a war effort, but found himself thrust into that position as a result of his power. ie Grindlewald is killing everyone and only you can stop him please help us! Thats another reason (besides his past friendship) it took so long for Dumbledore to enter the Grindlewald war. Eventually he couldnt ignore the plight of others (due to his fundamentally pacifist philosophy) he gave in to end the fighting. People saw him defeat Grindlewald and in future conflicts expected him to fight in them too. They made him their leader and forced him to do something he fundamentally disagreed with. Thats why he comes accross as inept in his decisions with Harry and with the Order, he genuinely has no idea and no real passion for, fighting a war effort. He is a teacher not a general and has no training in leading troops.

He runs the war like he would a classroom, giving his "students" tests like defending the DoM, and only stepping in when things go wrong and Voldemort enters the field, where he doesn't seek to kill or capture, but drive in a lesson. A lot of his manipulations is simply him having no idea what to do and falling back on his profession. Treating his soldiers like students and his enemies like naughty children who need a detention in Azkaban. This is never more obvious than the insane follow the clues quest he gives the trio which only works due to plot armor and a deus ex machina intervention.

 

i think that he was very maniplative cause first years were able to get past his enchantments and he was dumb not to know that it was a basilisk killing everyone. not to mention that he didnt give sirius a trial and couldnt do anything tog et harry out fo the tournament. and why didn't he tell harry about the prophecy? and why did it take him decades to find one horcrux when harryfoudn them in 1 year? and he made harry sacrfiice himself in the forest.

i could go on but i think were all in agreement here.

 

Whoa, slow down here. First of all, in first year Dumbledore's only enchantment was the mirror, which I think has already been established as a clever counter-measure. Second thing, I do somewhat agree that he should have been able to identify that the monster was a basilisk, you have to remember that it took a parslemouth to enter the chamber, any protections that he could have wrought might not have been able to cover all of the schools pipes thus the basilisk isn't stopped.

Third, Dumbledore wasn't in charge when Sirius was imprisoned or at least there were emergency measures used by Barty Crouch Senior, were Death Eaters were convicted and trialed very quickly. It is not unreasonable to assume that the massive outrage garnered from Sirius betrayal and subsequent deaths of the Potters drove this decision, public opinion is a powerful thing. Fourth, Dumbledore wanted Harry to have a relatively normal childhood, not tell him that he is doomed to confront this incredibly powerful, evil wizard and have that hanging over his head. Whether this was a wise decision or not is up to debate, but I think it displays the idea that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Lastly, I think it took Dumbledore a decade or more to find out if Voldemort used horcruxes or not, remember that this was extremely dark and rare magic, and as far as we know not the only way to gain a version of immorality. You must also remember that Dumbledore has multiple responsibilities so he can't give the problem all of his attention, or even the majority of it. Dumbledore is also the one who identified what objects the horcruxes most likely would be. Doing the majority of the leg work, all Harry had to do is find them and destroy them. Not an easy task, but not the hardest. Oh, and Harry had the choice to sacrifice himself or not, Dumbledore didn't force him. He might have used his position of trust and authority to hedge his bets i.e. Dumbledore would have been heavily disappointed if Harry didn't sacrifice himself.

Phew, now that I've written all that I can't tell if you were trolling or not