I am the Kat that Walks By Itself

Right?

Harry Potter is such a frustrating world! On one hand, the build is just fantastic, if you'll pardon the pun. It's the "secret" of its mass appeal.

Then you run into the fact that a lot of the world build was either handwaved or just not explained at all. Compounded with the "slapdash" timeline, as it was put upthread, and it has a lot of problems.

The only thing that you didn't mention about Dumbledore that has bothered me SO much is the announcement that he was gay.

Pretending there is no such thing as queer people in children's fiction is one thing, and though still the norm, was especially common at the time the books were written.

However. It jumps from authorial bigotry/erasure into something much stranger when it turns out that one of the characters actually was gay "all along."

Dumbledore is never shown having any romantic relationships throughout the series, including in flashbacks. The only exception is an admiration of Grindewald that is never explicitly stated as romantic, and is detailed in very different ways than Harry's attraction to Cho or Ginny, and is less emotionally written even than Harry's platonic friendship with Ron.

The canon implications begin at the Yule Ball, where Dumbledore dances with McGonnagall. Namely, WHY? Is he merely without any other partner, the entire male faculty being straight, or does he have to dance in a male/female couple because of wizard custom? No same sex couples dance at the ball at all, or at least are not mentioned. Are those to be "assumed" as well, or as in the dance lesson, is a male/female dance the only acceptable arrangement?
That one little scene now has huge implications for the entire world!

It's heavily implied that muggle bigotry is not always mirrored in the wizarding world. But Dumbledore's apparent closeted status implies that lgb (and most likely t) bigotry IS institutionalized within the culture. If someone of his fame and status can't be out, who can?

Now, returning to the problem of Grindewald. If we are to "infer" that Dumbledore is gay based on that, then let's talk about Remus and Sirius. Remus' werewolfism was stated as a metaphor for AIDS (unless that was a false Rowling quote). Isn't that, coupled with Remus and Sirius' relationship as it is in canon enough to infer that there is something going on between them? Not to mention Sirius's possibly platonic, possibly not, infatuation with James.

All of the Maurauder stuff would require a few essays of its own to fully get into, and I'm sure someone else in the fandom already has. But let's be real here, they had more "hidden" sexual chemistry than siblings in a Folgers commercial.

I'm trying to type this all on mobile and getting increasingly frustrated, so I'm just going to end my ramblings here.

The point I'm trying to make is that Rowling's "secret" canon bugs the ever loving shit out of me, and I wish she'd just write another book to get it all out, rather than making us piece it together from interviews and slogging through Pottermore. BUT, at the same time, it'll just lead to more annoying contradictions and override fanon that actually makes sense, so maybe I don't.

Augh augh augh