Rowling says Dumbledore is gay

[Steve]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "susanmcgee48176"
<Schlobin at ...> wrote:
>
> > 
> > Tonks:
> > I wasn't going to get into this since my POV is so different
> > than that of young people today. I have been so upset about 
> > what Rowling did. As you say it was too much wine, too little 
> > sleep or a check list. I add to that plain stupidity. How can an 
> > otherwise intelligent woman mess this up so badly? Personally I
> > think she needs a therapist. She seems to have a problem with 
> > father figures.  Remember when she almost killed off Arthur? 
> > ...
> > 
> > Tonks_op
> >

> Susan:
> 
> I'm so glad people are posting their points of view.
> 
> Here's mine.
> 
> J.K. Rowling is an extremely courageous, brilliant and insightful 
> woman. I've loved her books for years, and my children love them.
> 
> ...
> 
> I do think she's a little naive. No, she didn't say that DD was gay 
> to be "politically correct" or to check it off on a checklist. She 
> naively thinks that there's nothing wrong with being a lesbian or 
> being a gay man, and that the greatest wizard in the world was in 
> fact gay. She has no clue the uproar her comment will bring. ...
> 
> Bottom line is -- JKR doesn't see anything wrong about being gay...
> 
> Susan
>

bboyminn:

Here's the thing, she didn't actually say Dumbledore was gay. She said
something to the effect that "I always thought of Dumbledore as gay"
which is not quite the same thing.

In a sense, characters, even though the author creates them, develop a
life of their own. They take on unique personality that rise up
spontaneously. In that sense, I don't think JKR constructed Dumbledore
as gay, that was just a tidbit floating around in the background, in a
sense, floating around in the subconscious or inner thoughts of the
character, but they certainly didn't manifest themselves in
Dumbledore's outward actions. I mean we don't see Dumbledore flouncing
around and camping it up.

Someone once said something to the effect that 70% of our lives occur
inside our heads. No matter how adventurous and exciting our live
actually are, our imaginations, thoughts, and day dreams create and
even more exciting life for us. 

So, my point is, that JKR is imagining the inner workings, thoughts,
and feelings of Dumbledore's mind, even though those particular inner
workings have nothing to do with the story. Just as she has a whole
detailed history worked out for..say...Sirius, she has a similar
history worked out for Dumbledore.

In a sense, I'm saying that she didn't make Dumbledore gay, that
aspect sprang spontaneously from his character as it rose out of the
void and appeared in her mind, as characters so often do. 

So, she isn't saying 'I created a gay Dumbledore', she is saying when
she examined Dumbledore's history and inner workings, she /found/ this
aspect; she 'thought of him as being gay'. 

Further, that could just be a paraphrase of many more deeper and more
complex aspects of Dumbledore. It is possible the Dumbledore was
simply momentarily overcome by a teen-crush infatuation. That would
certainly represent an aspect of his personality, but we would be
unwise to totally define him by this one event in his life. 

So, again, characters just spontaneously develop, as they come to
fruition, various aspect arise that make them who they are, in this
case, Dumbledore just happened to have a crush on Grindlewald. But
Dumbledore live a good compassionate caring life. He dedicated himself
to education when he could have easily been in a position of extreme
political and economic power. I think more than this one minor
insignificant, unrelated to the story fact, we should judge Dumbledore
on the quality of his whole life.

Just a thought.

Steve/bboyminn