Albus Dumbledore is gay. It’s true. The former headmaster of Hogwarts prefers the company of men.
He walks around in long, elaborate robes. He spent a summer trouncing around Europe with a male-companion-turned-jilted-lover. He even owns a phoenix, Fawkes, who could be described as “flaming.”
Last Friday, J.K. Rowling was asked by a Harry Potter fan if Dumbledore had ever been in love. In response, Rowling said, “I always thought of Dumbledore as gay.” This caused titters and even applause in the audience.
Who cares? Well, a lot of people. National papers and the Internet have been reduced to analyzing exactly what it all means. Various fan sites have been reading and rereading the books for clues and double entendres.
I’ve admitted in a past column that I’m a Harry Potter fan myself. Still, last I checked, Albus Dumbledore is a fictional character. Aren’t there more important things to talk about?
I guess not. Just last week the Hinckley Institute of Politics hosted a forum to debate Amendment Three, a nonsensical bill with the sole point of redefining marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
The forum barely made news, only garnering a paragraph at most in local papers. Yet, all around the world, both liberals and conservatives alike feel the need to take a stand on an issue taking place in a world that doesn’t actually exist.
One group is no better than the other. Radical conservatives have focused on the same point that haunted poor Tinky Winky years ago. The gay Teletubby could be, and was, somehow affecting the sexuality of their children.
At the same time, those in the gay community have given Dumbledore the official title of a gay-rights champion. He was a wise and tolerant mentor who stood up for diverse groups like werewolves and centaurs, and is therefore a representative of the gay community.
First, I’ve got news. Albus Dumbledore doesn’t really exist. Secondly, if liberals and gay rights supporters want to focus on the most important part of this revelation, it’s that there was nothing in the books to easily label him one orientation or the other.
It’s something I’ve always wondered about. I fully and strongly support the rights of the GLBTQ community simply because I fully and strongly support all rights. Yet, I’ve often questioned the motives of those who organize events.
Pride Week at the U was the right way to do it. The entire week had well-put-together forums and discussions that focused on the very real struggle of living a gay lifestyle. On the other hand, the yearly downtown parade spends less time on issues and more time on trying to be as outlandish as possible, featuring floats of scantily-dressed men and women, public spankings and more leather than a cattle ranch.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mind that either. Performers could run the streets stark naked and I wouldn’t bat an eye. Of more concern is the image they are portraying to less open-minded curmudgeons.
Yes, there are men that dress as women and wildly sexual nightclubs, but gay people are not all flamboyant. Their lives are not all lived in “The Birdcage.” Their existence is normal because their existence is a human existence, just like everyone else’s.
Albus Dumbledore is gay, and it doesn’t matter. It’s the lesson we can take from J.K. Rowling’s revelation.
I look forward to a day when we stop analyzing the sexuality of fictional characters and, more importantly, stop worrying about the sexuality of those trying to live their lives freely in the real world.
That, dear readers, would be magic.
