ALTERNATE HELLS

While I regard myself as a spiritual person, I am not a religious one. Having had negative experiences with organized religion on the few attempts I've had occasion to try to get involved...mainly that they were all, hands down, a bunch of hypocrites. I decided along time ago that I could indulge any vice and/or sin to my black little hearts content without the spectre of that god I pretended to believe in ruining it for me with the knowledge of the burning hell that awaits.
It has worked pretty well so far.
But the increasing focus on god and religion in US politics, the governments tampering with our morality in the name of god is really scary. Then the Schiavo thing. Then the pope died. And lets not forget that little war over in Iraq and Afghanistan which could be characterized as a crusade if you think about it that way. Evangelical hootenanny disguised as spreading democracy. At the rate Bush and company are going, we might see "The first church of republican jesus and the democratic way" centers popping up in a couple of years.
The increasing attempts at legislating "morality" here in Texas and across the country is frightening to me. The latest here is a law that would punish high schools for allowing cheerleaders to perform in "sexually suggestive ways" or some such shit. The author of this law says the country is looking to Texas to set the standard. I think the rest of the country is laughing at us. To me this is religio-insanity, and, impossible to enforce in any meaningful non arbitrary way. Example:(my mindset) Pelvic swiveling/thrusts are an integral part of dance, and by coincidence, look an awful lot like intercourse. (religio-nut mindset) It's sex...SEX...SEX!!!! If we don't put a stop to this sex right away all of our cheerleaders will contract aids, get pregnant and simultaneously be victimized by internet pedophile trolls...and get hooked on crack.
It's been a long time since I was in the same circles as cheerleaders ( high school to be exact) but even back then in the stone age, most cheerleaders talked the talk, but didn't walk the walk...sure, there were rumors and the occasional cheerleader that doubled as a slut. But cheerleading itself didn't lead to unabated sin and debauchery. If it did, I would have been there, with bells on.
Anyhoo... This long winded intro brings me to a thought I had today. What if they ( religio-nuts ) are right? Or, what if they finally convince the vast majority of us secular sinner types that they are right ?
Whatever the case, latter or former, we are all going to hell.Except the people currently in power, they are going to heaven. Why heaven? If you can actually reconcile and couple the division of church and state it stands to reason that god can be bought off if the price is right. And then I thought, what exactly is hell?
Or more to the point, what happens when I die? I've thought about this a lot. And I've come up with several alternate versions of hell.
Hell V.1 : You are simply "rebooted" and life starts over exactly like it did the first time, you encounter the same situations and choices. You know how it's going to end since you've been here before, but kind of like the game Riven, you are provided clues that will allow you to alter the course of your life.Of course, V.1 locks up, a lot.
Hell V.2 : There's nothing but fire and brimstone and your world looks like a set off the original Star Trek. It's really fucking hot and people scream all the time, except for sunday. Sunday is BBQ day. But at the end of the day, the screaming begins again. Why? All that fire and brimstone burned the BBQ and you hate hot dogs with that black leathery skin.
Hell V.3 : Baptist hell...is filled with naked women and bottles of booze. The bottles are full of holes, but the women aren't. I know this is an old joke, but when I heard it as a kid the imagery stuck and I wondered how horrible this kind of hell would be. When I got old enough, the thought of not being able to drink or fuck was the embodiment of hell.
Hell V.4 : You get to watch your life unfold from birth to death on endless repeat, seen from the perspective of people that hated you and your family, complete with color commentary.
Hell V.5 : You are reborn as Michael Jackson.
whats your version of hell?