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My Own Personal Circles of Hell

r. 501, posted on July 25, 2010 by melissamd

Excerpt

Everyone knows the story of Dante's Inferno, and the levels of Hell he created. Ever thought about creating your own cirlces of Hell, and who you would put there?

Text

&ldquo;Abandon All Hope of Intelligent Life, Ye Who Enter Here&rdquo;
 Gates of Hell: As you may recall, Dante ascribed the outer limits, outside of Circle One, outside the gates, to cowards. Works for me. So cowards will cower here, in fear of making any decisions. They fear the &lsquo;dark ones&rsquo; on the other side of the gate, and they fear anyone who may approach the gate. These were the wafflers in life, on the fence for all the important decisions, always too timid to make a leap, to take a stand&hellip;EVER.&nbsp; These people went through life not living it, so now they are destined to have one foot on both sides, in a way.&nbsp; They are destined to be part of neither world&hellip;
Circle One:&nbsp; In Dante&rsquo;s classic, this circle was reserved for virtuous non-Christians&hellip;those who were good, but were either not saved, or did not go to church. Great thinkers, heroes, and many creative minds were here&hellip;Not so in my hell.&nbsp; I believe those people would go straight to heaven, if we are assuming there is an opposite to my hell&hellip;Anyway.&nbsp; In my circle one, you will find the idiots. Those who were &lsquo;saved&rsquo; and believed the word of the Bible was IT.&nbsp; Those women who tell childless women they have not served their purpose on Earth.&nbsp; Bible-beaters who can see only one way&mdash;only one religion, only one image of God.&nbsp; Those who are so small-minded that they cause wars to start over the objection of another&rsquo;s belief in a higher power, a way of life, a religion.&nbsp; Those who kill in the name of their god&hellip;Those who decide they are enlightened because they are saved, and in the name of God take lives, rule others&rsquo; lives, dictate what others can do with their bodies, their minds&hellip;
In this circle, I would make sure that these &lsquo;sinners&rsquo; would be preached to for all eternity, by ministers of different faiths&hellip;just as soon as they fell asleep, someone would knock on their doors, preach &lsquo;the word&rsquo; to them for hours&hellip;perhaps strap them in front of TV and have them watch Scientology documentaries&hellip;
Circle Two:&nbsp; Again, Dante&rsquo;s idea was thus:&nbsp; Circle two would be for those who lusted (surely a sin!!)&nbsp; and for all eternity they would have to chase the objects of their desire.&nbsp; Now, I don&rsquo;t know about you, but that&rsquo;s pretty much my Earthly punishment&hellip;so I&rsquo;m going to go easy on the lustful.&nbsp; My circle two involves all those touch-up artists&hellip;those crafty men and women who sit down with their paint programs and shave inches off the celebrities&rsquo; and models&rsquo; thighs, tummies, arms, and butts in magazine ads&mdash;the ones who make young girls have eating disorders&hellip;the ones that cause men to have impossible expectations&hellip;resulting in women hating their bodies, seeking our plastic surgery, etc etc&hellip;the cycle goes on and on. So, these creative mouse clickers would be stuck in a fun house for eternity. They would never know which way was up, and would be constantly seeing their bodies in contorted positions and images&hellip;hopefully driving them quite mad.
Circle Three: In Dante&rsquo;s hell, this level was for gluttons, those who ate and drank to excess.&nbsp; I think, though, I&rsquo;ll put all the lollipop girls here&hellip;sort of using circle two as a jumping off point, I&rsquo;ll throw all the tiny skinny unhealthy sickly looking women with the big lollipop heads here.&nbsp; They will be stuck here for eternity, eating. We will feed them...and if they refuse to eat, we&rsquo;ll intubate.
Circle Four:&nbsp; I&rsquo;m going to go with Dante here. He reserved this level for avarice and prodigality.&nbsp; I think all those CEOs with the golden parachutes, all those CEOs who took bonuses larger than everyone I know&rsquo;s lifetime salaries put together&hellip;we&rsquo;ll stick them all in this shack&hellip;with tattered clothing, scrounging for food&hellip;no amenities, no luxuries&hellip;OR we&rsquo;ll just have them all try and survive on a teacher&rsquo;s salary&hellip;
Circle Five:&nbsp; Dante wanted all those who practiced wrath and sullenness to have this level of hell to themselves. He believed these angry people (one an open form of anger, the other a more repressed form) deserved one another.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ve decided to give this particular floor of our Hell Mall to those people who crave power, crave outlets that give them a quick avenue to baseless power&hellip;the nightstick is one way to wield it, but there are others&hellip;say, administration in organizations such as&hellip;say, schools, where their underlings are children and teachers (lower life forms, obviously) and the administrators have absolute power.&nbsp; So corrupt cops, cops in the profession for the wrong reasons, administrators who have no desire to actually enrich their schools, help the children in their schools, help the teachers they &lsquo;administer&rsquo; to&hellip;they will all be here. They will sit through classes, 24/7, on mindless things&hellip;say, team building, peer pressure, gang signs&hellip;bullying&hellip;how to bond&hellip;&rsquo;how to&rsquo; classes on anything and everything, day in and day out&hellip;and they will not be allowed to talk in class without raising their hands&hellip;there will be strict rules governing everything, including bathroom breaks&hellip;perhaps an intricate hall pass system, where everything is recorded in triplicate&hellip;
Circle Six:&nbsp; I&rsquo;m just going to reject Dante&rsquo;s ideas altogether here, and reserve this circle for bad parents and bad drivers. Those who had no business being parents, those who do not want to be parents and show it, those who try and live their lives over again through their children. Parents who ruin their kids psyches through various Modes of Operation.&nbsp; They belittle their children, they push, they taunt&hellip;Abusive parents will be here too, abuse of any kind.&nbsp; OH and let&rsquo;s not forget celebrity parents who go overseas to adopt cute kids, when America is full of children in orphanages starved for love and good homes.
People who drive slowly in the left lane, people who drive endlessly with their blinkers on&hellip;drivers who get beside other drivers and never pass, blocking us all in&hellip;people who don&rsquo;t pay attention to the traffic lights and don&rsquo;t go on green&hellip;people who do not understand that they CAN turn right on red&hellip;
These parents will be subjected daily to the same abuse they inflicted upon their children, they will be forced to watch what they did to their kids&hellip;celebrities will be forced to live in despicable foster homes&hellip;given subpar care&hellip;etc&hellip;The drivers will be forced to ride bicycles forever, in circles.
Circle Seven:&nbsp; Dante reserved this level for the bad guys: murderers, rapists, and so on. Sure, I agree.&nbsp; But I also think those who murder movies and music should be included. Over-actors like Russell Crowe, Colin Farrell, Quentin Tarantino (only when he acts, but seriously, writers/directors should stay on the other side of the camera!!)&hellip;actors who try and sing&hellip;singers who make ears bleed&hellip;They will all be subjected to watching their own material, listening to their own voices&hellip;for eternity&hellip;
&nbsp;Circle Eight:&nbsp; Fraud.&nbsp; Dante found the fraudulent to be some of the worst offenders on Earth.&nbsp; I concur, but I&rsquo;m going to go out on a limb here, and assume he wasn&rsquo;t actually thinking along these lines:&nbsp; Any man or woman who posts a fake or outdated picture on an internet dating site&hellip;any man (or woman) who posts a celebrity picture as their own on a social site in order to pick up the opposite sex&hellip;anyone who removes a wedding ring before going out for the night in order to meet someone&hellip;Those who write bad checks or pay their employees with bad checks&hellip;ebayers who knowingly fraud their buyers or sellers&hellip;
He included flatterers here, and seducers.&nbsp; I concur once again.&nbsp; Anyone who says, &ldquo;You look just like (insert celebrity or super model name here)&rdquo; in order to get lucky should be in hell.&nbsp;&nbsp;In hell they should all&nbsp;develop very bad acne, have halitosis, and be eternally celibate.&nbsp; And only be able to shop at Wal-Mart.
Circle Nine:&nbsp; Dante felt treachery was the worst sin of all&hellip;so I guess we all know who I&rsquo;ll put here...George W of course.&nbsp; And he will subjected to watching his own press conferences, The Daily Show, and SNL on loops forever&hellip;oh, and he can only eat pretzels :)
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