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On more than one occasion, the Harry Pottercharacters made a choice that was unwise or downright dumb at times. In some cases, these bad choices didn’t go unpunished and the heroes’ lives became even more difficult.
5 Dumbledore: Giving Gryffindor Too Many Points
As a Hogwarts principal, Dumbledore shouldn’t favorite one house over another. Yet the series shows several times that he prefers Gryffindor to other houses, or at the very least, over Slytherin. This is obvious at the beginning of the first movie when Slytherin is supposed to win that year’s House Cup. That all changes when Dumbledore gives a lot of points to Harry and his friends - in fact, just enough to change the result and have Gryffindor win the Cup instead. While it’s true that Harry and the other Gryffindors deserved recognition for their actions, by doing this, Dumbledore effectively demoralizes the Slytherin students.
They’ve been working the entire year to earn enough points and win, and at the last possible moment, Dumbledore undermines the effort the Slytherin students put in and could also destroy their motivation to try again next year because they could think Dumbledore would pull the same stunt the next year. In other words - he does a good enough job of making a quarter of the students feel like no matter what they do, it’s not good enough.
4 Lockhart: Trying To Fix Harry’s Arm And Competing With Snape
Gilderoy Lockhart starts as a new teacher at Hogwarts, but it soon becomes obvious that he’s awful at teaching… and at magic… and at everything that a teacher at Hogwarts should be able to do. It comes as little surprise when the movie later reveals that Lockhart is a fraud who stole other wizards’ and witches’ accomplishments and pretended they were his own. The problem is that Lockhart knows he’s just a fraud and cannot do magic. Yet he repeatedly puts himself into situations where he has to demonstrate his magic skills in front of other people - and each time, he fails in a rather spectacular fashion.
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When he duels with Severus Snape, Snape wipes the floor with Lockhart. And when Lockhart tries to heal Harry’s arm after Harry falls from his broom, Lockhart removes all of Harry’s arm bones instead. That doesn’t instill other people’s confidence in him and doesn’t support Lockhart’s carefully built reputation as a powerful wizard. The best course of action for Lockhart would be to stand away and let someone else do the job. But then again, he’s arrogant enough not to want to let other people take the spotlight from him, no matter the consequences.
3 The Weasley Family: Not Taking Their Rat To A Vet Earlier
The Weasley family members are far from stupid, yet they fail to realize that something might be going on with their rat when the said rat lives much longer than rats are supposed to live. Even Hermione’s cat (whom Ron calls dumb… oh, what an irony!) recognizes there’s something fishy about the rat. And one of the first things Sirius Black points out is that twelve years is a long lifespan for an ordinary rat.
The Weasley family should have taken their rat to a magic vet or any other scientist a long time ago to find out exactly what was going on. Or at the very least, they could have monitored Scabbers more closely in order to pick up on any suspicious behavior or health issues that might be expected for such an old rat.
2 Multiple People: Questionable Romances
Romance is complicated, and the Harry Potter characters often learned this the hard way. While some couples were able to make it work long-term, other relationships just turned out to be really dumb decisions. When Ron and Hermione were denying their feelings for each other and dated other people (mostly to make the other one jealous), it didn’t turn out so well. Ron dated Lavender Brown who clung to him and Hermione had an unpleasant experience going on a date with Cormac McLaggen.
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There’s also Harry’s ill-timed romance with Cho - they got together after Cedric had died and Cho was still upset about Cedric’s death and cried a lot, something Harry had little sympathy for. But almost nobody had it as bad as Dumbledore who fell for Grindelwald when they were still young, only to find out that the object of his affection was an evil sorcerer.
1 Harry And Ron: Behaving Like Brats At Times
Even though Harry was the protagonist of the series, that didn’t mean he was always sympathetic. Harry could be rash, moody, and rude. That was especially true in the fifth movie. It later turned out that it wasn’t entirely his fault and also, teenagers often struggle with keeping their emotions in check, but that doesn’t change the fact that the damage was already done. Harry managed to break off his relationship with Cho, argued with his friends, and most importantly, he didn’t take his Occlumency lessons seriously, which in turn led to Sirius Black’s death.
Ron then had the same problem, especially when he was jealous of either Harry or Hermione. When Ron thought Harry put his name in the Goblet of Fire, he stopped speaking to his friend. And when Hermione was having fun with Viktor Krum at the ball, Ron made sure to spoil her joy. Not to mention that he and Harry completely ditched their dates, which wasn’t fair to either Parvati or Padma, who had the misfortune of going to the ball with two guys who wanted to take someone else.
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