Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is not the longest Harry Potter film, but it is the longest of the Harry Potter novels. Even beyond the pages themselves, the Order of the Phoenix has quite an extensive history. The Order readers and viewers see is the second incarnation of the group, the first having grown up before Harry and company were even born, during Voldemort’s initial rise to power.
That gives the group quite a history of both good and ill, successes and failures, for us to examine. While the Order of the Phoenix always meant well, it wasn’t always making the best decisions, and often ended up doing more damage to those around them than to those they were actually fighting.
Watching Harry
If keeping Harry safe was one of the main motivators of the Order in their second incarnation then they didn’t set themselves up for success from the start. As trustworthy as Mrs. Figg is, setting only her and Mundungus Fletcher to watch Harry at any one point is a mark against the group’s function as a whole. They should have understood one another well enough, the strengths and weaknesses of each member, to know better when setting pairs up in the schedule to watch out for Harry Potter while he resided at number 4 Privet Drive. They set themselves up for failure by not paying more attention to the individuals in the group.
Letting Snape Be A Bully
There was little anyone in the Order itself could do to Snape when he bullied his students, but when he bullied other Order members, someone should have spoken up. The way Snape was always needling at Sirius, or bothering Lupin, or being rude in general to every single human being around him, someone should have told him off (Dumbledore for starters). No one should have been afraid he’d defect just because they spoke back. To maintain a well-run organization it’s important to hold everyone to the same standards, both where work, as well as kindness, are concerned.
Not Paying More Attention to Moody
For a group that had so much history, it’s still shocking that no one, Dumbledore or anyone else, was able to tell for a whole year that the Mad-Eye Moody teaching students was not the real Mad-Eye Moody at all, but a Death Eater imposter.
The Order of the Phoenix may have started out by watching for details and clues in the world around them, but they forgot to pay attention and take care of the members who were supposed to be doing that work in the first place. And obviously they didn’t treat each other with any more respect when the organization broke up.
Stranding Sirius
The Order of the Phoenix decided that it was safer for Sirius Black, and everyone connected to him, to stay in hiding at his parents home, 12 Grimmauld Place. There couldn’t have been a crueler ultimatum laid down on the former Azkaban convict. Besides frustrating an already injured and tortured man, they were also hindering their own success by not allowing Sirius to use any of his particular skills, whether his experience in prison or his ability to turn into a big black dog as an animagus. It was both mean and unwise of the Order to leave Sirius behind.
Trusting Pettigrew
Perhaps the worst mistake the order ever made was trusting Peter Pettigrew. He was not only able to give away the location of the Potters to Voldemort, but he was also able to offer details about the Order, its movements, and its members to the other side. Trust is important, but blind trust can hinder any organization, and it certainly hurt the Order of the Phoenix in the worst possible way. Again, they failed because they didn’t really understand the people in their own organization.
Not Trusting Lupin
Again, the worst thing the Order of the Phoenix ever did to one another was not understanding or truly caring about the people in their own organization. While the Order seemed to trust Peter Pettigrew, even Sirius Black mistrusted his own friend, Remus Lupin, when a mole was discovered in their midst. Prejudice was alive and well in this group of “good guys” just as it was with the Death Eaters they faced. If the Order had really known or cared about Lupin they never would have assumed he was the mole, and they might have been able to divert catastrophe if someone had just talked to him.
Switching Secret Keepers
Again we have to examine the Order of the Phoenix and their understanding and trust of their own members. When Sirius switched from being the Potter’s Secret Keeper and allowed Pettigrew to take over the job, Sirius didn’t tell anyone. This not only led to the death of James and Lily but the imprisonment of an innocent Sirius. If Sirius had trusted the organization he was participating in enough, someone would have been able to come to his defense and perhaps even advise him not to give up the Secret Keeping job himself.
Hiding Hallows and Horcruxes
As the man who set up the Order, Albus Dumbledore was still quite the loner. It’s shocking that he would set up an organization to help fight Voldemort, and then neither use it wisely nor offer it every advantage and scrap of information.
As is obvious when Harry and company set out to hunt Horcruxes, Dumbledore left no adult Order member with the information. Think of the time that could have been saved if Harry had been allowed help.
Not Publicizing
Unlike the Ministry of Magic and Voldemort himself, the Order was unaware of the power of a good headline. They were so secretive they weren’t able to trust one another and were unable to better publicize their aims as well as their successes. They hurt their organization by being as secret as they were.
Disbanding
Dumbledore admitted he always thought Voldemort might return and yet the Order of the Phoenix disbanded with the death of James and Lily and the survival of little baby Harry. Perhaps, had they stayed together, and not waited until the Boy Who Lived turned fifteen, they might have saved more people and avoided many of the losses and catastrophes in the Second Wizarding War.
