How bureaucratically can YOU make hell?

[Eldan]

can i sig this? funny as hell

Feel free. I haven't been Sig-quoted in ages.

[Mono Vertigo]

...Wow your comment legitimately made me want to kill myself for a minute there at how dark it is I offer you all my cookies, all my internets, and this shiny medal ... I hope you have a wonderful day and continue to offer such amazing guidance on this fine playground... Now if you'll excuse me, I'll just go think about my life...

Huh. I'm torn. Glad to have communicated properly my vision of bureaucratic Hell. Not so glad I inadvertently made people depressed.

[Calanon]

Huh. I'm torn. Glad to have communicated properly my vision of bureaucratic Hell. Not so glad I inadvertently made people depressed.

LOL kiddo, don't let it get to you I'm to egotistical and prideful to ever truly go through on a suicide attempt. Good job, You gave me the perfect image of my own personal hell

[Eldan]

Well, that's Kafka for you. Don't talk about it if you don't want to depress people.

[begooler]

Keep in mind, the people processing the forms should also be punished. They should not only hate doing their jobs, they should be totally unqualified for them.

Another way to punish them is for them to be overqualified for their job but completely unequipped to do whatever menial task they are supposed to be doing. A clerk who was a powerful wizard in life sits at a desk for eternity, his sole purpose is to receive two pieces of paperwork and staple them together. The stapler is borked so that every time you successfully staple something, you have to take apart the stapler and reload the staples again to get it to work, and even after doing that, 50% of the time it just tears a hole in the paper. This renders whatever work the petitioner has accomplished with their paperwork so far useless. The clerk only has one box of staples for all eternity, so he has to re use all of the ones that get bent up when the stapler jams. This just makes the stapler jam more frequently. He is constantly trying to trick petitioners or other clerks into bringing him more staples, and as a result screwing up many processes and slowing their process.

On top of this, the clerk will never be told this fact, but the paperwork is supposed to be paper clipped, not stapled. There's another clerk somewhere who's desk is full of nothing but paperclips, but he's never given a real job, so he spends eternity chaining them together.

All the offices are either unequipped, impossible to find or redundant.

Before we imagine what a municipal office is like in hell, let's start with a humble example of a real DMV office in my city.
The office is underneath a bridge. If you make a wrong turn trying to get there you end up paying the toll and going across the bridge. Now you have to turn around and come back across the bridge to try again.
Most of the parking spots are labeled: POLICE VEHICLES ONLY
There are some civilian parking spots, which are usually all full, possibly by the employees of the office.

A sign on the door reads...
No first time licenses
No learner's permits
No change of address
No reissue of confiscated license
No written test
No name change
No photos taken

..basically informing you that if you want to do anything with your license that couldn't just be performed online (ordering a renewal to be received by mail) then you're in the wrong place. Why didn't you just stay home or go to the library?
So it turns out, what you want is to change your address or something. That's why you need a new license in the first place. You walk in, take a number, wait behind a few people whom you can't fathom what they are here for since this office doesn't do anything. Then your number is called. The clerk hands you a photo copy of the directions to another DMV. The address is circled in highlighter.
One can only imagine is that the only thing that happens in this office all day is three people come to work in the morning, the first one there presses "copy" on the photocopier, they spend a few minutes highlighting things, and then spend the rest of the day playing backgammon.

[Slipperychicken]

[DMV Horror]

I personally imagine that there was exactly one living, breathing person answering every phone in Hell, and he died two years ago, but no one noticed because someone's still collecting his paychecks. All calls are perpetually on hold. A customer service representative will always be just a few minutes away. The hold "music" is an elevator tune recorded in the Far Realms, steadily warping your mind as you wait for ever.

[Solaris]

Let's look at an average souls day in hell, shall we?

7:00 AM-Awake from sleep on your pallet.
7:01 AM-Begin filling out the form that acknowledges the right of another soul to make your bed in your absence, in return for which the straps which hold your arms to the bed will be removed.
7:10 AM-Begin filling out forms to remove neck and leg straps, in return for which you agree to work 400 hours in the mines.
7:30 AM-You have removed yourself from the bed by 7:31, the time at which you stipulated that would be out of the bed when you signed for it the other day. This brings a sigh of relief from your lips, as not fulfilling the contract would waver your right to water for the next 3 months. You can't die from it, but you can feel very, very parched.
8:00 AM- You begin to fill out the paper work for using a latrine. The paper work is designed so that you have to sign it throughout the 300 page book, but there are no visible signs of where to sign it except context clues in the writing of the contract.
9:00 AM-You use the restroom
10:00 AM-You finish the paperwork to leave the rest room.
11:00 AM-You file the paperwork to be given a one day work visa. If you don't work, they neither feed nor water you.
12:00 PM-Work starts.
12:00 AM-You file the paper work to be relieved from work, and are given a cup of water and a crust of bread in return.
1:00 AM-You file paperwork for a bed, which you eventually get due to your punctuality and work ethic.
5:00 AM-You fall asleep after filing the forms that allow a human soul to sleep, the form for getting rid of bedbugs, and a request for a blanket.
7:00 AM-Awake from sleep on your pallet.

That much sleep? They feed you daily? Feh. Hell's getting soft these days.

I imagine Hell as being inspired by my last deployment: Nothing but waiting in line, standing in formation, and being yelled at by people with perhaps not as much brainpower as they should have, all to no purpose at all.

[Calanon]

That much sleep? They feed you daily? Feh. Hell's getting soft these days.

I imagine Hell as being inspired by my last deployment: Nothing but waiting in line, standing in formation, and being yelled at by people with perhaps not as much brainpower as they should have, all to no purpose at all.

Spoiler

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God Bless America

I guess in hell its "To each his own" kind of deal... Everyone has there own version of hell and suffer in there own individual way...

I didn't mean for this thread to devolve into a religion type deal, I just wanted to have an understanding of what people thought happens in the 9 hells

I'm sorry everyone

[Gamgee]

I would just do nothing, if it requires me to sign forms in hell. What are they going to do to me? Torture me? What's going to happen to me since I'm already in hell? Am I going to die and go to super hell?

[Rorrik]

Sorry? For what? It's hardly as if we're arguing with each other. You've just brought up a much hated topic: bureaucracy, and we all have a lot to say about it.

Now apply that to hell, and as long as it remains bureaucracy, it will be hellish.

[Doorhandle]

LOL kiddo, don't let it get to you I'm to egotistical and prideful to ever truly go through on a suicide attempt. Good job, You gave me the perfect image of my own personal hell

It gets worse: Suicide is a cardinal sin amongst the catholics.

That much sleep? They feed you daily? Feh. Hell's getting soft these days.

Well, it's not surprising, what with all the succubi paladins, extremely angry godslayers, dramatic resuces and jaywalking abounding these days, it's amazing hell has any structure left!

Also, they were asking how bureaucratic you could make hell, not how horrible. A minimum level of nicety helps efficnesy, even though this seems to be the opposite of the point we are making.

[Tvtyrant]

That much sleep? They feed you daily? Feh. Hell's getting soft these days.

I imagine Hell as being inspired by my last deployment: Nothing but waiting in line, standing in formation, and being yelled at by people with perhaps not as much brainpower as they should have, all to no purpose at all.

I think of it as the boiling frog scenario. If you just throw them into horrid tortures they will lay down or riot, or riot and then lay down. If you slowly make their lives just a little more awful, you can make them keep going forever.

[Empedocles]

This:

If a player wants to go to the bathroom in Hell, he must sign and have approved, by the 7th Circle Jr. Administer-in-training Sector 9A87301, every square of toilet paper.

To gain access to the 7th Circle Jr. Administer-in-training from Sector 9A87301 you must first contact the Senior Manager's Assistant in Division 314383453BBB, who will only talk to you if you have an orange permission slip from the Vice Presiden't Senior Secretary of 91aAsv Permission Slips.

Unfortunately, with only a reccomendation from the Senior Manager's Assistant in Division 314383453BBB you can only receive blue or yellow permission slips. Neither will do anything for you whatsoever, but the Senior Manager's Assistant from Division 314383453BBB will insist that he needs an orange slip.

Persist enough, and he "remembers" that it's actually the Vice President's Senior Secretary 1aAsv2 Permission Slips that he needs. Give him this, and he'll send you back up the chain.

Unfortunately, the 7th Circle Jr. Administer-in-training from Sector 9A87301 won't only accept the word of the Senior Manager's Assistant in Division 314383453BBB, but will also require a grey permission slip from the Secretary of the A5 Treasury's 7th Secretary of the 9th Circle...

and so on.

Once you've done all of that, you must only repeat the process for every square of toilet paper you wish to have signed and approved. Unfortunately, the devils sign with metal pens, which usually rip the toilet paper in the end anyways.

Spoiler

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The 9 Hells have lots of dirty butts.