Unsettling thoughts

[valarltd]

I'm noticing an unsettling trend in mentors: the good guys lie. The evil mentors are always straight up and brutally honest.

The more I write Luke, the less I trust Obi-Wan and Yoda.
The more I read Harry, the more I wonder if Dumbledore is actually as incompetent as he looks, or if he's playing his own game with everyone else for pawns.

Consider:
He hires poorly qualified or wildly inappropriate teachers:
Hagrid
Trelawny
Lockhart
Lupin (great teacher, but the lycanthropy thing)
Mad-Eye Moody (decent teacher, even if it wasn't him at all)
Blinns

Sometimes I think the only good teachers at Hogwarts are McGonagell, Flitwick, Sprout and Sinistra. Snape is a good instructor, but a very poor teacher. He intimidates, bullies, and openly plays favorites. He loathes Hermione, simply because she is Griffyndor and a friend of Harry's. Every other teacher thinks she's the bee's knees. He can't get past James' abuse of him to see that Harry is not his father. (Harry/Snape skeeves me beyond reason, for just this reason. I mean, I'm not going to hook up with the child of MY highschool tormentors!)

He plays favorites. The end of Sorceror's Stone always bothered me because it felt calculated to humiliate the Slytherins.

He allows Harry wild amounts of leeway, which is not good for that age. And the whole "don't tell him anything" deal just sucked.

He obfusicates, never gives a straight answer when a cryptic one will do, and knowingly puts his students in danger (Fluffy, the Chamber).

I wonder if Dumbledore is as senile as he likes to pretend, or if he's as good as everyone thinks he is...

Comments

[blakefancier.livejournal.com]

Dumbledore is like Machiavelli squared. I definitely think he's playing games, very dangerous games. I mean, if he keeps messing around with Harry like this, the poor boys gonna turn to the darkside of the force. I was really angry at Dumbledore in this book, especially after that lame excuse he gave Harry.