J.K. Rowling Outs Dumbledore

Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling shocked a Carnegie Hall audience on Friday night when she revealed that Albus Dumbledore, headmaster at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, is gay. So clearly this is the most exciting news in basically ever, as evidenced by the 2,469 comments already posted to the news brief on The Leaky Cauldon, a Harry Potter fan site. We are kind of goofily proud of Rowling for springing this on an entire generation of kids and think this is the kind of out-of-left-field move that people might still be talking about 50 years from now. But what does the rest of the Internet think?

• “If I ever thought Jo could not impress me any further, I was SO wrong. To have one of the coolest, most respected wizards in history and mentor of Harry Potter as gay, is the bravest move JKR has EVER made. I salute her.� [Leaky Cauldon commenter Shain]

•�WHAT? I could care less if someone is gay (as I, myself, am gay), but I do have a problem with Dumbledore being gay, because she didn’t write the relationship between Grindelwald and Dumbledore that way at all. Either she decided that after the fact or she can’t write romance worth a darn. Pathetic Rowling, just pathetic.� [Leaky Cauldron commenter gaymanspeaks]

• A British gay-rights activist states the obvious, pointing out that it’s a nice step forward for gay people but that it would have been much more impressive if Rowling had written even the slightest hint of Dumbledore’s orientation in the novels themselves. [Telegraph]

• Blogger Travis Prinzi writes intelligently about the culture wars likely to spring from this announcement and reminds readers that they’re not required to read Harry Potter the way J.K. Rowling tells them to read it. [Sword of Gryffindor]

• A blogger at Redstate.com complains about Rowling’s “selective argument for tolerance�: “I wonder where her tolerance was for those readers who have beliefs different from hers. Where was the respect for them? Don’t they too have a right to avoid and hide themselves away from ideas and themes they disagree with? I guess not.� [Redstate.com]

• This August Fox News headline seems extra exciting now, doesn’t it? [FoxNews.com]

• And finally, enjoy this one-year-old YouTube video of Dumbledore and Voldemort singing “If You Were Gay.� [YouTube, skip to 3:39]

J.K. Rowling Outs Hogwarts Character [AP]

Related: Ten Other Fictional Characters Whose Outings Won’t Shock Us That Much

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