J.K. Rowling and the Dumbledore Sexual Identity Mystery

[FalloutJack]

I'll never understand the phenomenon of people trying to outsmart the author. Anyone can come up with a theory on something, but only the 'professor' has the answer sheet. If I were to theorize that Dumbledore was actually wearing a fake beard the whole time, it would be a fun theory, but it would be wrong.

You are giving authors WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY too much credit.

And the comparison is not correct honestly.

In other words... uhm, fan fiction can, has, and will at times be more compelling then what the author has created. No matter what George RR Martin may believe in.

I'm not saying it couldn't be compelling. The Nobody Dies version of Evangelion is brilliant. HOWEVER, it's not the actual author's tale. Regardless of quality, Word of God trumps all in terms of meaning. It's not like how George Lucas declared all Star Wars books canon here. A fanfiction is an alternate universe based upon the original text. It doesn't change the actual story.

*Shrugs*

Sorry, that's just how it is.

Actually, it is how you think it is. It is not that way to me. At all.

There can be a "canon" (how funny... we are talking about completely fictional stuff ) version made by the author. And fan versions or spin offs or whatever. They can be in their own universes. And equal.

Ah, but it's not a question of equality. Taking Nobody Dies as an example, I think that universe is better and more entertaining than the original. It's very cool. But...it's not the one that came first. It's a story based on the story, not The Story. I could make a stunning and incredible ending to Big O that explains everything about everything and give us a conclusion to all the happenings in Paradigm City, BUT unless the creators call me up and say "You da' man", it's not the real ending no matter how good it is. It's just a really good theory, a thought experiment, an intrigue. It's not about the quality. It's about who started the journey in the first place, who paved the way to lead to it.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

Why is him being straight important to how you imagine him?

Why is it important I have to have an answer to that?

Literature and art can be interpreted different ways and this was always the way I saw it. If there is no maliciousness behind it, I don't feel it really should matter to anyone... I would never say that Rowling's comments ruined the character for me or made the series worse in anyway. I understand her being the author and the person who made the character gives her the ultimate authority on who the character is officially but how it gets interpreted is completely out of her control.

One would almost be led to believe this controversy has little to do with whether or not it was in the book, and everything to do with him being gay.

I dunno. I just get tired of having to defend the very idea that I have the ability to think differently from the author and be comfortable doing so. Of course the sexuality element has been a lightning rod to this that wouldn't exist otherwise (and this happened to a series that was long hated by certain Christian elements in any case). Would I be speaking up about it if it were not about the sexuality and some other aspect of the book? Well, if people were similarly declaring me to be a disgusting human being (such as a homophobe) because of my interpretation of an element in a book was different, I wouldn't feel any different.

I don't hate anyone over this and I'm not going to demand Rowling retract her statements on his sexuality. I'm not seeing how this attitude about a fictional piece that I generally hold privately is a dangerous one.

 

[FalloutJack]

A few problems:
"It's a story based on the story, not The Story."

Every. Single. Thing. Ever. Is like that.
Sometimes, the similarities are great. STALKER/Stalker/Roadside Picnic/Klondike is an example. But not the only one.


"that explains everything about everything and give us a conclusion to all the happenings in Paradigm City,"

A good ending is not necessarily one that explains everything ... Not at all.

"it's not the real ending no matter how good it is."

Nothing we are talking about is technically real. It does not matter. It is an IP, bussiness at its worst and art at its best. But not a real thing.

"It's about who started the journey in the first place, who paved the way to lead to it."

Definitely not ANY one person in the last 5-6 thousand years.

Aren't you just nitpicking on the dubious claim that nothing is original anymore? It doesn't actually change anything that's been said.

 

[Aaron Sylvester]

JK Rowling is an absolute idiot for "revealing" that little detail - she should have done what any good writer does, i.e. let the READERS decide for themselves. It was a quirky little mystery of it's own, best left to people's imaginations.
Instead JK chose to stir up a shitstorm and ruined the story for many people. Why did she do that? For what benefit? It's a very sensitive topic (she knew that), so why the fuck did she do it? It boggles the mind.


To me Dumbledore wasn't gay and never will be, regardless of what JK says.

He was my favourite character in the entire series. If I had known he was gay at the time I was reading the books, that would NOT have been the case (because that's my opinion/preference).

So Dumbledore remains perfectly preserved in my memories, the old brilliant powerful wizard who was certainly NOT gay.

I loved Rowling and everything she did before 2007, and I forever will. But she made a very stupid decision after that.

They do, but that doesn't mean they're right. If the /creator/ of the works says that something IS, that is what it is, regarldess of how strongly the interpretor feels it's something else.

Since we're dealing with something entirely fictional, nobody is "right". Not even the creator. They do have the biggest say and influence, but in the end it's how people PERCEIVE their work.

So no matter how much JK screams "Dumbledore was gay", I choose to ignore those words from her and believe he wasn't. It's not part of Dumbledore's character for me, and never will be.

 

[Therumancer]

JK Rowling is an absolute idiot for "revealing" that little detail - she should have done what any good writer does, i.e. let the READERS decide for themselves. It was a quirky little mystery of it's own, best left to people's imaginations.
Instead JK chose to stir up a shitstorm and ruined the story for many people. Why did she do that? For what benefit? It's a very sensitive topic (she knew that), so why the fuck did she do it? It boggles the mind.


To me Dumbledore wasn't gay and never will be, regardless of what JK says.

He was my favourite character in the entire series. If I had known he was gay at the time I was reading the books, that would NOT have been the case (because that's my opinion/preference).

So Dumbledore remains perfectly preserved in my memories, the old brilliant powerful wizard who was certainly NOT gay.

I loved Rowling and everything she did before 2007, and I forever will. But she made a very stupid decision after that.

They do, but that doesn't mean they're right. If the /creator/ of the works says that something IS, that is what it is, regarldess of how strongly the interpretor feels it's something else.

Since we're dealing with something entirely fictional, nobody is "right". Not even the creator. They do have the biggest say and influence, but in the end it's how people PERCEIVE their work.

So no matter how much JK screams "Dumbledore was gay", I choose to ignore those words from her and believe he wasn't. It's not part of Dumbledore's character for me, and never will be.

I've given some run downs on the entire series of events, but remember that JK Rowling was under fire from Christians for a very long time. The whole gay push came in response to statements she made about her works when she was being challenged by Christian moral authorities for promoting homosexuality and witchcraft. What she said to pacify those critics, lead to SJWs challenging the diversity and liberalism of the HP universe. Once everything was done the SJWs kept coming after her, and wouldn't go away even when she made some diplomatic statements. It basically went from JK Rowling saying "none of my characters are gay" to "if any of my characters was gay it would probably be Dumbledore" to "Dumbledore is gay". albeit spread across years. This is one of the reasons why I oppose the whole SJW movement as they force themselves on everyone and everything very persistently and wind up ruining things by bringing social politics into places where it simply does not belong. So far these is really no way to get these people to just shut up and go away, and what happened with HP is an example of why some kind of legal recourses to harassment over social politics is desperately needed. Not just because of the gay thing, but because of the way the Christians were riding her as well, this whole mess exists because when she started to become popular you had everyone jumping all over her and her fantasy world with their social and moral political battles. Of course because it was so long ago, most people don't remember the Christian commentary on these stories and to see how it all started you need to understand that beginning. It also needs to be understood that she never went out on her own to make any kind of social statements, the ones she did make, like in regards to Christianity and Dumbledore being gay were not bombs she just dropped, they were literally because of people following her around and berating her over this stuff and threatening to drag her and her works through the mud if she didn't do what they wanted. This is one of the reasons why I think it's kind of funny whenever people act like Dumbledore is some kind of gay icon or whatever, he might have been if it was intended, but it wasn't.

 

[Stg]

Holy hell. All this over a simple tweet that didn't mean a damn thing? Both of them were correct in their own right since Rowling didn't portray Dumbledore to be a flamboyant homosexual in the books (or movies for that matter), so people weren't expecting it when it was revealed. The thing is, his fictional sexuality didn't detract from his character, the story, or anything for that matter. People who dwell on this simple fact are so damned narrow-minded they really should stop trying to break it down into what the TC did.

The person who said she can't see him as being gay was an innocent statement and Rowling's response was absolutely perfect because gay people are still just people. Midgets are still people. People of different skin color are still just people. Criminals are still people. Politicians might not be human, but they are still people (it's a joke, calm down). I guess people who live on Tumbler, Twitter, here, and other forms of social media are getting way too involved in labels and can only see people as who they label themselves. A girl I work with is an avid Tumbler fanatic (and I use that term loosely with her) and she is constantly telling people not to refer to her as a female, girl, woman, etc. because she says her identity is (insert highly asinine string of acronyms here).

People really need to get off the Internet and just take a moment to realize that everyone is different, but we are all just people living the best we can and not everyone's conversation needs to be shown the world and interpreted in 4,000 different ways. It's the age-old argument of "when the writer wrote about the black curtains, they were foreshadowing their depression... or perhaps they just wanted to tell you the damned curtains were black because that's the image that popped into their head".

Give it a rest.

 

[elvor0]

They do, but that doesn't mean they're right. If the /creator/ of the works says that something IS, that is what it is, regarldess of how strongly the interpretor feels it's something else.

Since we're dealing with something entirely fictional, nobody is "right". Not even the creator. They do have the biggest say and influence, but in the end it's how people PERCEIVE their work.

So no matter how much JK screams "Dumbledore was gay", I choose to ignore those words from her and believe he wasn't. It's not part of Dumbledore's character for me, and never will be.

So she created the character in the first place, but if people decide it enough, what she created stops being what she created and becomes something else because people don't like a certain aspect of the character? That's ludicrious, it seems mad that despite the fact that she created the whole world, the laws within and the characters within said world, you're arguing that she doesn't have creative control over everything she created?

I don't even think she's a particuarly good writer, but your statement of "She should of done what every good writer does and left it to the readers decide" obviously translates to "So I can make everyone hetrosexual and live in a bubble." Letting the readers decide also means that we can never mention characters sexualities again, so that "the readers can decide". I mean, can't explicitly state this dude is straight, some gay people might get upset(Ah fuck it, that's never gonna happen).

You know why she might of made Dumbledore gay? Because that was the character she created and she was kind of hoping that people NOT have a shitstorm over a character being gay in 200 and fucking 7. You're right, it is a sensitive issue, but y'know what? Nobody ever got anywhere without confronting the issue, rather than hating the issue and quietly hoping it'll go away and the only people being "sensitive" are the minority who take umbrage with people being gay. Rowlings British, and here we don't give a rats arse about who you fuck so long as it's legal.

Can people intepret Harry to actually just be using Ginny as a beard because he's really got the hots for Ron and they'd be right, regardless of how much the narritive should slap them for being so daft?

I mean the whole thing with Grindlewald seems pretty clear cut to me. And how does him being gay detract from his character or capabilities? He's exactly the same mad but brilliant Dumbledore. Would it have been okay if Grindlewald was a woman? It's not like she's saying he was gay for Harry or something(because that /would/ be wierd) and it doesn't effect the overall plot in any way, beyond fleshing out his back story. Although if you just hate gay people, say it now and get it over with, otherwise we're going to decend into a very, very circular argument and we might as well save each other some time.

Waaait a minute, I never read the last three books, but that /was/ cut from the film wasn't it?

Either way, in regards to the fan; Dumbledores sexuality is never so much as given a sub atmoic size of mention in ay of the preceding books or films, so how you could decide either way beyond assuming the default of him being hetro is anyones guess. If it's that black and white in the last book about Dumbledore, that assumption ends up being wrong, because there was no evidence prior to that to suggest your assumption was correct.

Yes, it was. Here's what was cut out if you fancy a read:

Spoiler

Basically Dumbledore's sister, Ariana, was caught doing magic by three muggle boys when she was six. She wasn't able to show them how to produce magic like she did, so they violently assaulted and (heavily implied) raped her. Dumbledore's dad went and killed them and was sent to Azkaban for life, and the ordeal left Ariana traumatised and unable to control her magic, which made her slightly dangerous if she got upset. Their mother decided not to send her to Hogwarts because of this and people that knew of her assumed she was a squib.

Anyway just when Dumbledore completed Hogwarts his now 14 year old sister had an incident with his mum where her emotions and magic spun out of control, which caused an explosion that killed their mother. This means Dumbledore had to stay at home to look after his sister while his brother completed his final year at Hogwarts, and then Grindlewald came over from Europe to stay at his aunts for the summer. Him and Dumbledore met, realised they were both gifted in magic, and the whole "spending an obsessive amount of time with each other and writing each other secret letters" thing happened. Gridlewald had ambitions to become wizard Hitler by basically finding the Deathly Hallows, which both of them could use to help take over the wizarding world and rule over muggles. Dumbledore agreed it was a good idea and he'd help him with this (which of course makes more sense if you factor in Dumbledore being in love with Grindlewald).

They spent all this time together for a couple of weeks until Dumbledore's brother finally confronted them, saying that they're spending so much time together that Dumbledore is neglecting his sister and how are they going to do all these ambitious plans whilst taking her along with them. A big argument broke about between the three of them and then eventually a three way duel. Ariana ran out to try and break it up but she was hit by a spell and killed (none of them knew which of the three of them did it). Grindlewald ran away back to Europe, and Dumbledore's brother blamed Dumbledore for her death and broke his nose at her funeral.

Then 40 years later, in 1939, Grindlewald became wizard Hitler and the slogan he used was one that Dumbledore came up with in their letters ("For The Greater Good") and it turns out he'd discovered the (Unbeatable) Elder Wand. He began to take over Europe, but he suspiciously avoided Britain. Everyone urged Dumbledore to go over and stop him, but Dumbledore also kept on suspiciously avoiding it until 6 years later when it became impossible for him to ignore. They had a massive duel and, despite the fact Grindlewald held the Elder Wand, was powerful enough to basically take over Europe for 6 years, was at least evenly matched to Dumbledore in ability, and his plans would be ruined if he lost the duel, he still lost. That's the only time the Elder Wands master loses a duel in the whole series, so the implication is that Grindlewald couldn't bring himself to kill Dumbledore even after all this time. Grindlewald was sent to prison for life and 50 years later Voldemort, who was looking for the Elder Wand, tracked it to him and broke into his cell. Instead of saying Dumbledore (who was dead by that stage) had the wand, Grindlewald just laughed at Voldemort and taunted him by using his real name repeatedly. He wasn't afraid of Voldemort or dying, and he didn't give up Dumbledore after all these years and all that had happened, so Voldemort killed him in frustration without gaining any information.

In the movies all you get is seeing a young Grindlewald briefly stealing the Elder Wand in a flashback, an older Grindlewald being confronted by Voldemort in prison and laughing and taunting him but still giving up that Dumbledore has it, so nicer movie Voldemort leaves without killing him, and you meet Dumbledore's brother who mentions that he and his brother didn't really get along, and you see Ariana in a painting which is used to gain access to Hogwarts from the pub (though that pub bit does actually happen in the book).

Because they cut all that stuff out of the movie, Deathly Hallows Part 1 is basically just Harry, Ron and Hermione sitting around in a forest not doing much.

That is a massive shame. DH 1 was pretty naff, I would've liked to have seen that been present in the movie, I really liked Dumbledore anyway, but that whole chunk of back story being missing really detracts from the world building.

 

[FalloutJack]

Snip

Well, I'm sorry that it's not reassuring to you, but I'm speaking in terms of how it actually works. You can write anything you want about Harry Potter yourself - you could create Harry Potter and the Book of the Dead, featuring Bruce Campbell as the Defense Against Dark Arts teacher - and it still wouldn't be part of the core universe if they said no. It has nothing to do with how awesome you can write. (And if you're a decent writer like me, then more power to you.) It's how things work. If you want to make something official, it has to be "Charcharo's Tales of Potter", assuming they let you get away with that, and be satisfied with an alternate continuity that is not the same as the first.

Captcha: Falling pianos

OH SHI-

*CRUNCH!!*

Owww...

 

[FalloutJack]

Snip

Well, I'm sorry that it's not reassuring to you, but I'm speaking in terms of how it actually works. You can write anything you want about Harry Potter yourself - you could create Harry Potter and the Book of the Dead, featuring Bruce Campbell as the Defense Against Dark Arts teacher - and it still wouldn't be part of the core universe if they said no. It has nothing to do with how awesome you can write. (And if you're a decent writer like me, then more power to you.) It's how things work. If you want to make something official, it has to be "Charcharo's Tales of Potter", assuming they let you get away with that, and be satisfied with an alternate continuity that is not the same as the first.

Captcha: Falling pianos

OH SHI-

*CRUNCH!!*

Owww...

I am not talking about publishing and making money off of it. That is dealing with IP and publishing, which is a whole other an of worms.

I am talking critique and value. Artistic one. The one where people like me who dont give a flying fuck about who's property it is but want to view it as its own peoduct.

Well, I'm sorry, but that's not what was on the table here.

 

[FalloutJack]

If so I apologize. But it is what is on my table. Always.
And the way shit is going... probably till I die.

Then, let us agree to disagree, make peace, and cover the OP in tar and feathers.

...always wanted to do that.

 

[FalloutJack]

If so I apologize. But it is what is on my table. Always.
And the way shit is going... probably till I die.

Then, let us agree to disagree, make peace, and cover the OP in tar and feathers.

...always wanted to do that.

Lets.

As for the OP... well I must say I did not even read, nor do I care. These debates here... I dont get em. I really dont.

Don't bother reading it. I skimmed and it's all just boiling down to hating on the author because of Dumbledore, followed by a round of not wanting to listen to anyone with a counter. So basically, I don't get it either. I've had much better.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Eh, the only reason Dumbledore's sexuality is relevant at all is because homosexuality is a hot button issue now.
If you aren't gay or otherwise invested in that social-progress business (beyond avoiding the usual allegory of systemic guilt and the public internet shame-game), it's utterly meaningless.

The post-publication declaration of Dumbledore's sexuality is meaningless outside of audience head-space: There's no continuity change, no thematic change, hell, not even a literal change in text (not even subtext, "that-which-goes-unprinted"). You can say the context changed, but as malleable as the context is here (again, head-space) I question its value OUTSIDE of the social-political bicker-bandwagon.

As for Rowling and her rights as a creator, I wouldn't fret.
She's the owner of one of the most lucrative media franchises of the past 20 years, and set for life several times over.
(a former billionaire, if Forbes is to be believed)
At this point, I feel comfortable stating that her right to expression as a person and as an author has been proven enough.

Maybe if she had wrote Dumbledore as explicitly gay when she was still actually working, it might have meant something more because there was real risk involved in making that statement as an author at that time.

Now? Well what's the worst that's going to happen?
Random powerless, anonymous idiots on the internet will whine at her?

 

[Relish in Chaos]

I don?t know what you?re talking about when you say Ms. Rowling?s response to the fan was inappropriate and thoughtless. Arguably, what the fan said was inappropriate and thoughtless (and maybe even a little bit homophobic); she didn?t give a reason as to why she ?can?t see Dumbledore that way?. Did she expect him to burst out of the ground in a rainbow tutu singing It?s Raining Men or something? Or that we needed an entire chapter devoted to Dumbledore making out with Grindelwald under the moonlight, because it was much more important than destroying all the Horcruxes and killing Voldemort like the fans actually wanted?

Rowling said her character?s gay, so her character?s gay. A fan asked a simple question, and she got a simple answer. Why does an author need to have a reason to make a character gay when they don?t if their character is straight? Would we be having the same discussion if she wrote a fanfic in which Spider-Man was a Sikh living in London?

There?s nothing wrong with analysing a creative work, or arguing (as some may?ve) that it was a rather trite political statement since she announced it after the series had already ended (although, if it was political, she could?ve chosen any character to be gay) and ol? Albus was the only character explicitly noted to be homosexual in a baker?s dozen of various characters for which sexuality was never even made a topic (and why should it be? It?s a book series about a bunch of teenage wizards and witches trying to defeat Magic Hitler).

I mean, a long while ago, the manga author Toriyama seemed to have decided that Tenshinhan (Tien) from Dragon Ball was a descendant of a three-eyed alien clan, giving an explanation as to why he had a third eye in the first place and could do stuff like grow arms out of his back and duplicate his body. Many fans disagreed with the statement, saying that there never needed to be an ?explanation? for all the oddities that Tenshinhan ? or, for that matter, a whole host of weird characters in DB (e.g. Kuririn?s lack of nose, whatever the fuck Chaozu was meant to be) ? had, and that it lost the fantasy element of his character. But it was designed to be canon, so? it is.

What about JoJo?s Bizarre Adventure, another manga series? The source material itself, as well as one of the supplemental materials that came out after the subject in question, stated that the Stand, ?The World?, is DIO?s Stand. But some interpret various events and inconsistencies in the story itself to in fact be telling us that ?The World? is the Stand of Jonathan Joestar and DIO just stole it. And depending on who you talk to, what happens towards the end of Part 7 supports or contradicts this. (It?s set in a different universe anyway, and the author, Araki, still hasn?t come out and said whether or not it?s the same universe as the one created in Part 6).

Or how about the question of whether or not Rick Deckard is an android in Blade Runner? Ridley Scott, the director, said he is; Harrison Ford, the actor who portrayed him, said he isn?t. (Not to mention, that film?s been released, like, three times now, each with various omissions and additions that can change the mood of an entire scene.) Who?s right and who?s wrong? Does anyone have to be right or wrong? Should we just go by the book it was loosely based on, where Deckard was in fact a human? Whatever, just go with your own interpretation without trying to make everyone agree with you.

You don?t have to think of the character that way, but you can?t change authorial intent. Why should she have to justify her creative decisions if she doesn?t want to or thinks the request is stupid?

 

[Aaron Sylvester]

So she created the character in the first place, but if people decide it enough, what she created stops being what she created and becomes something else because people don't like a certain aspect of the character?

"Becomes something else"? You're exaggerating, I didn't suddenly decide that Dumbledore was actually female, or actually a wizard-shaped potato. His sexuality was never stated in the BOOKS, therefore I choose to believe he was straight.

That's ludicrious, it seems mad that despite the fact that she created the whole world, the laws within and the characters within said world, you're arguing that she doesn't have creative control over everything she created?

She has creative control over what she writes. Not creative control over how that work is interpreted.

I don't even think she's a particuarly good writer, but your statement of "She should of done what every good writer does and left it to the readers decide" obviously translates to "So I can make everyone hetrosexual and live in a bubble."

What I want out of my fiction/fantasy entertainment is in my own bubble. Problem?

Letting the readers decide also means that we can never mention characters sexualities again, so that "the readers can decide". I mean, can't explicitly state this dude is straight, some gay people might get upset(Ah fuck it, that's never gonna happen).

She was free to mention characters' sexualities in her BOOKS - she already did with most characters who got were already into straight relationships, or ended up that way. It's not hard. I would not have been "upset", it's just that Dumbledore would no longer have been my favourite character. That's all.

But she chose to leave it ambiguous, and when a writer does that it's clear they want to leave it to readers to discuss of fantasize over.

I mean the whole thing with Grindlewald seems pretty clear cut to me.

Not really, it was far from clear cut because the thought of Dumbledore being gay didn't even remotely occur to a MILLIONS of people of all ages, die-hard fans included.