Dumbledore's decisions---and Harry's, and everybody else's

[Eric Oppen]

No: HPFGUIDX 158977

One thing that I think a lot of us on this list tend to forget is that, _in 
the books,_ Dumbledore doesn't have endless hours to ruminate over the best 
possible decision to make in a particular situation.  Neither does Harry. 
They have to act _now,_ not after chewing the whole thing over for hours, 
and getting input from several thousand obsessive fans.

On this list, we have endless time to think things through, and what one of 
us doesn't think of, several (dozen) others will.  The characters in the 
book don't have this luxury.  They often have to improvise on the fly, and 
don't have our advantage of knowing what's going on in other places.

I will admit, Dumbledore could have handled Mrs. Cole better.  However, I 
wonder how often _this_ particular situation (magical child raised in a 
Muggle orphanage) has come up?  I'd guess that most, if not all, magical 
children are raised by their parents, (Muggle or magical) and that being 
abandoned as thoroughly as Young Tom was is extremely unusual.  Dumbledore 
could also have been operating on experience that was decades out of 
date---he was already nearly a century old when he went to get Young Tom 
Riddle, and what he knew of orphanages might well have dated from the time 
when Queen Victoria was newly widowed.  One big, big disadvantage of the 
cloistered lives that the magical folk lead is that their knowledge (if any; 
I do remember Archie at the QWC) of how the Muggle world operates can get 
very dated if they don't make a conscious effort to keep up with the times. 
I've known of Americans who were startled upon visiting Britain to find that 
it wasn't really much like the Britain they were expecting---they were 
expecting something like the Agatha Christie books, or Peter Wimsey, if not 
(at least subconsciously) the Sherlock Holmes stories.  Within my own 
lifetime, Britain has changed hugely (and, I would say, mostly for the 
worse, but that's neither here nor there) so imagine how much change someone 
like Dumbledore has seen.

And Dumbledore _should have_ kept a closer eye on the Dursley situation. 
While I will not defend his neglect (he does not do so himself) let's keep 
in mind that he did have quite a few other things on his plate.  Right after 
Harry was dropped off, he had to deal with "Lord Voldemort's followers," 
many of whom he admits were almost as powerful and evil as their master.  I 
imagine that a good percentage of those people didn't want to come along 
quietly and would have scorned to use the "I was Imperiused!" 
defense---think Bella Lestrange, only more so.  The Wizengamot must have 
been running on triple overtime to sort these cases out, and many of the 
defendants would have had powerful influence to bring to bear to keep from 
conviction, as well as a lot better knowledge of how WW "trials" operate 
than poor Harry did in OotP.  (Incidentally, I am still slightly shocked at 
how such trials seem to be run---Rumpole of the Bailey would go absolutely 
spare at the thought of allowing a defendant to appear without a barrister!) 
In addition, he had a school to run, which would be a full-time job in 
itself, and I expect that he had to deal with the effects of Voldemort War I 
on the school---for all we know (oh! for a copy of _Hogwarts: A History!_) 
some of the teachers might have been implicated and need to be defended 
and/or replaced, quite a few students may have lost family members, and so 
on and so forth.

He may have hoped that the Dursleys would bond with Young Harry.  Their 
failings with Dudley do not come from malice, after all, so much as from 
misplaced and excessive love.  Personally, I would have said that if they 
_had_ bonded with little Harry, he might well _have_ arrived at Hogwarts a 
"pamepered young prince,"---I have had fun imagining how Dudley would have 
done at Hogwarts, what with his bullying tendencies.  A Dursleyized Harry 
could have out-Draco Malfoy'd Draco Malfoy, and tyrannized the school to an 
extent that made his father's worst excesses look like nothing at all.  He 
should have had a closer eye on the situation _chez_ Dursley, but I don't 
know what he could do, particularly if Harry _had to_ stay with them to come 
under the blood protection.