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August 30th, 2016
Issue XIX. The Seventh Son

Index
I. Funkadelia Interview
II. Spotlight News
- Department of the Seven Sins
- Longest Sitting Delegate record broken
III. Ask Fredd!
IV. The Cosmic Crack: Life through the Eyes of the Clown Prince
V. Artwork of the Damned
VI. Wetwork's History Unconvolutecised

Funkadelia Interview
Interviewed by, The Stalker

1. In the beginning there was Funk, tell me about that, what is the origin story of Funkadelia?

Funkadelia was formed when the Starchild arrived to Earth from his Mothership to spread the holy Funk across the land. Starchild was an agent of Dr. Funkenstein, who is the intergalactic manipulator of the Funk, and is able to cure all of humankind's problems. As he said, "the bigger the headache, the pill, and [he's] the big pill." He left the secrets of the Funk in the Pyramids, and Funkadelia is the land where the followers of the Funk unearthed the meaning of the Funk Pyramids.

2. Recently elected to the position Chancellor of the Founderless Region Alliance, what vision do you have for its future? Will you be bringing the Funk?

I plan on bringing the elite defender illuminati across the entire NS World. I also plan on starting a gofundme campaign to buy NS from Max Barry so that I can become the founder of The North Pacific and make it my own personal colony.

Seriously though, I have plans to seriously improve the FRA under my charge. I plan on reinvigorating our Rangers and working with our member regions to help them improve, as well as helping our defender friends across Nationstates to develop.

3. When did you begin your defending career? What would you consider your favorite defending operation so far?

I started my NS career in the region Taijitu, and back in 2012 I asked to join the Taijitu White Army. Gulliver, the delegate at the time, directed me to the United Defenders League so that I could start helping out with some defenses. In fact, I just looked it up for the purposes of this interview. In June 2012, I joined the UDL, and I can't remember what the liberation was that we did, but I just remember Solm teaching me how to defend.

People frequently ask me what my favorite defending operation has been. To be honest, I have a difficult time remembering all of them because there have been so many! Every liberation gives me the same rush every time. I just really care a lot about the regions I defend and liberate. So I'd say the most recent one I'm really proud of is Singapore. It's rewarding to get such a great payoff from going around all day and organizing people and reaching out and pulling them into our operations. I love it.

4. Now as we're both apart of the GP elite we both know about shadowy organization known as the Empire bent on conquering the major GCRs through political manipulation and allegiances, who control roughly 50% of GCRs currently, what are your opinions on them? What about the equally shadowy organization known only as the Network, bent on rivaling the Empire and sabotaging them from within? Do you believe the Alliance is the last hope for GCRs and anyone wishing to avoid evil shadow governments? Would you like one of my spare tinfoil hats? They keep their mind control rays from getting in.

Oh, yes. I'm very aware of Empire. And the Network. They're very scary indeed. All I have to say is that those dastardly criminals ought to beware of our Alliance. We're coming for you and we'll protect everyone from your evil reign! I make my own tin foil hats, you can't trust anyone!

5. Why are you a defender? What is your personal philology you base your entire life off of? Are you on team Red, Yellow, or Blue? Does pineapple belong on pizza?

I'll tell you seriously, I have a lot of deep personal feelings about defending. I know it's popular to be edgy and say "I don't care about the natives it's just because I want to do it!" For me, though, I care a lot about helping people out who most of the time have no idea what's going on. I've seen so many regions utterly destroyed and communities busted because of an invasion. I think it sort of ties in with how I am as a person. I've always cared very deeply about helping people out wherever I can, and I think everyone should make efforts to help each other, rather than only think about their own personal gain or profit.

I'm actually on team Blue. It upsets my boyfriend because he's on team Yellow and everyone makes fun of them. :P

PINEAPPLE DOES NOT BELONG ON PIZZA. THIS DEBATE NEEDS TO END.

6. If you sold me, er, made a Faustian bargain with the Devil for your soul, what would you ask for?

I would ask for 1,000 endorsements so I can be as popular as Ravenclaw is.

Spotlight News
Compiled by, The Stalker

Establishment of the Department of the Seven Sins

Hell recently established The Department of the Seven Sins. A better organizing of all Hell's existing programs, and programs being developed. All of which will allow for greater sin production, give people the opportunity to get involved easier, and create a one stop shop for everything going on. It will continue to be developed in the coming months.
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Longest Sitting Delegate record broken!

The Stalker recently overtook the long held Longest Serving WA Delegate title, formally held by Cynical Alcoholics with 715 consecutive days, who also remains a devoted member of the region to this day. It is truly a marvel the continued collaboration necessary to make this feat possible a second time, to have held the seat consecutively for two years in Hell, and it is an honor to expand upon it.
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(Hell's Bells welcome submissions for future Spotlight News articles, contact The Stalker for details.)

Ask Fredd!
Advice Column by, Freddland

Dearest Freddbert,
Your answers to serious questions seem, how shall I say, glib. Are your answers to be taken seriously or to be viewed as entertainment only?

Perplexed

Perp,
My answers to reader's questions are to be taken most seriously. How seriously, you ask? Serious as death. Serious as bringing a marshmallow to flamethrower fight. Serious as your mom asking you for a condom. Serious as... nah, i make all that stuff up.

Fredd
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Have a question for Fredd you'd like to see answered in the next issue of Hell's Bells? Submit here via telegram to Freddland.

The Cosmic Crack: Life through the Eyes of the Clown Prince
Article by, Laveyan inferno

Some men aren’t looking for anything logical, like money. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.-Alfred Pennyworth; The Dark Knight

With Gotham City as his playground, and its citizens merely his toys, the Joker has proven through his many adaptations to be, both psychologically and externally, the epitome of chaos. A pathological egomaniac with a background history as distorted as his mind, he is an enigmatic hybrid between creative morbidity and dark humor. It is these traits that have allowed him to endure and thrive through the ages, and he remains an icon of villainy. But what drives his madness, if there is even a method to it? How does he derive such joy from his reign of terror? Is it merely psychopathy, or is there a more complex reason beyond mental instability that makes him tick?

No matter the adaptation of his character, all of them have one thing in common: One bad day; one traumatic push that sent him tumbling through the escape exit of madness. Whether it was the vat of chemicals, the death of his wife, or his abusive father, once he crossed that threshold, he reached the point of no return. Either as a coping mechanism to sever himself from these negative emotions for good, or out of the need for revenge against a society he felt had failed him, he reinvented himself within a drastically short period of time. Much like how one would view the zany, slapstick shenanigans of cartoons like the Looney Tuns, the Joker seems to have adapted a third person perspective of himself and everyone else. A good comparison would be “The Fly on the Wall,” an untouchable, unknown observer of an event or chronology of events. So when Batman is pulverizing his or when he blows a hospital sky high, he views it all as comic antics. The disconnection he has from basic human instincts such as self-preservation and empathy has allowed him to deal incredible amounts of damage to others, and has enabled him to casually dismiss dangers and injuries with a gleeful cackle.

At his core, the Joker is undoubtedly philosophically similar to absurdism. From his scarring experiences in life, he has come to view the world, along with the suffering and tribulation that it produces, as totally meaningless. He takes this philosophy a step further, though, by not only embracing life as pointless, but finds hysterical joy in the emptiness. The randomness, and oftentimes, harshness of life is to him a spiteful gag directed by some invisible hand of fate. In short, life’s a joke. What gets him riled up even more is what he sees as ridiculous attempts by society to impose law and order upon the truly chaotic nature of the universe. This viewpoint is displayed well in his “Average Man” soliloquy from the comic The Killing Joke, in which he makes a fine example of Commissioner Gordon.

“Ladies and gentlemen! You've read about it in the papers! Now witness, before your very eyes, that most rare and tragic of nature's mistakes! I give you: the average man. Physically unremarkable, it instead possesses a deformed set of values. Notice the hideously bloated sense of humanity's importance. Also note the club-footed social conscience and the withered optimism. It's certainly not for the squeamish, is it? Most repulsive of all, are its frail and useless notions of order and sanity. If too much weight is placed upon them... they snap. How does it live, I hear you ask? How does this poor pathetic specimen survive in today's harsh and irrational environment? I'm afraid the sad answer is, 'Not very well'. Faced with the inescapable fact that human existence is mad, random, and pointless, one in eight of them crack up and go stark slavering buggo! Who can blame them? In a world as psychotic as this... any other response would be crazy!" - Batman: The Killing Joke

The Joker, expanding upon his perceived revelations of the haphazardness of life, sees the world as a card game and each life as an individual card from the deck, with its own identity and “suit,” or motivation: The heart, which represents emotion; the spade, symbolizing intellect; the diamond, symbolizing wealth; and the club, representing power. His analogy places people into two main categories: the numbers and the face cards. The numbers are the hoi polloi of society, the dull masses with little to no significance to him. The face cards are those select few that gain the Joker’s interest, those of prominence like Commissioner Gordon or Bruce Wayne, or those who have affected him in some way, such as Batman or Harleen Quinzel. The Joker, it seems, generally detests both of these “classes” in equal measure, the former for their insipidness and complacency, and the latter for continuing to play by the rules despite their higher status. This leaves the Joker card; one that is well known for its uniqueness and spontaneous nature. It is a wild card that often disregards the conventional rules placed upon the other cards. And thus, it is clear as to how the Joker perceives himself.

Reinforced in his conviction by the card which he bases his choices upon, he shuns society’s rules, and, in an engrained sense of superiority, executes this worldview in a demeanor quite befitting of his theatric appearance and name: that of a stage performer, a deranged artist essentially. His sought masterpiece is the distortion of the world around him to fit his vision and he pursues this goal through a variety of methods ranging from wanton violence to psychological manipulation. The mayhem he reaps is as much a statement as it is a stand-up routine for him; one of upsetting the established order by causing as much trouble for law enforcement as he can. Yet, even being the wild card that he is, at some point, he began to realize that with the rise of new enemies such as Robin and Batgirl that threatened to tip the balance, he couldn’t continue the fight for Gotham’s soul on his own. It dawned on him that in every card deck, there are not one, but two Jokers.

Enter Harley Quinn. A lovable bundle of crazy, she acts as the Joker’s stage assistant and companion. She’s the extra needed muscle and cunning to help him in his escapades, as well as an extra dose of comical mischief for fans. In the human comedy that the Joker performs, Harley is the Shakespearian accomplice; she’s the one who observes the trials of the protagonist and adds a greater layer of depth to his struggle. For the whole point of his “performance” is to fill the meaninglessness of life with a joke, however horrid it may be.

Gaining notoriety meets this end for the Joker as well, similar to the recognition desired of any ambitious artist. There are of course, the random onlookers, which again, are just numbers to him, and he only sees them as disposable pawns or impressionable puppets. His true target audience is, in essence, face cards. And this is somewhat contradictory to his initial view of such people of influence. On one hand, yes, he does view them as misguided in their beliefs. Yet, on the other hand, he needs their approval, or more often, disapproval, to validate his “artwork”. The confirmation he receives from them fuels him to make his next act more insane than before. And of these audience members, his favorite is none other than the Batman himself. A stark contrast is, to him, a blatant challenge to his worldview. He views the Batman as the sharpest of critics who just downright hates his style and guts.

Indeed, the enmity between these two characters is a practical Ying and Yang conflict; two opposite and opposing forces constantly clashing with one another, neither gaining significant ground over the other. And while Batman always thwarts the Joker’s attempts to turn Gotham City into his own personal amusement park, he fails to subdue the ideas behind them. The movie, the Dark Knight, portrays this impasse perfectly whenever Heath Ledger’s Joker fails to coerce the occupants on board the evacuation ferries into literally blowing each other out of the water. Batman then attempts to persuade him into seeing that he is wrong in his view that other people go down the same path of insanity when misfortune emerges, as the Joker did. But, in the end, the Joker won that philosophical argument, for he was able to take the most virtuous, moral man in Gotham, Harvey Dent, and turn him into a murderous sociopath.

In conclusion, when one compares the Joker with other super-villains, what makes him so much more dangerous and unique is the fact that he doesn’t outright fight against good. His ingenious strategy in defeating good is to infiltrate it and distort its very meaning. He challenges the moral framework of his audience by pointing out hypocrisy and incongruities he sees in those who deem themselves morally upright. It is his way of unraveling the madness that lies within the human condition.

Artwork of the Damned
"Cosmic Tree"
20x20 Oil Painting by, The Stalker

Wetwork's History Unconvolutecised
Article by, Zen beatitudes

As we all know Jesus was crucified on the hill of Golgotha in the Aramaic tongue. What is not commonly known outside of the most clandestine of secret societies is that this Hill had a turbulent history for more creatures than man.

This was the site of the Great Pelt Fire of 129BC, when one clever rabbit living in the Golgothan Warrens accidentally discovered fire after scratching stone with his claws while a piece of flint was caught in them. Suffice to say it ended poorly for everyone but the local meercat colony of Lower Calvary who ate very well indeed for the following month. Also beneath this earth arose the great trace leader Quickthigh Khan who in antiquity led the invasion and subjugation of thousands of subterranean square miles across Europe and into Asia minor. He eventually died of a heart attack mid coitus and his empire shattered, never to rise again.

Then we have Jesus, who through his great and decidedly unnecessary murder makes the burrows sacred ground. The divine blood of the son of something people call a god, sanctifies the hill including the burrows beneath. Thus rabbits are made holy, their cuteness defence more potent, their fur warmer, their feet abnormal repositories of luck and their flesh even tastier by His sacrifice. He hath raised them like unto himself, for it is a matter of biblical record that Jesus had incredibly lucky feet and was in fact nailed through them to counteract this with Roman ‘bad luck’ nails.

What people who lived near Golgotha failed to realise in the years following Jesus’s resurrection and the subsequent undead rabbit plague, was that these rabbits, while seeming normal (although decidedly lethargic and oddly carnivorous) were in fact immortal. It’s hard to pick when a bunny goes rogue let alone zombified. The truth was only understood when Golgotha exhumed its long burnt dead which shambled around medium rare for a number of years. These specimens had a caramelized taste to them due to a high diet in natural sugars, though the eating of undead was generally frowned upon in polite society (it is a backwater province after all, not Rome where that sort of thing happens all the time).

The great weather god slash newly omnipotent Yahweh looks upon things and is very unamused. Who wants to be watching people excreting still moving zombie rabbits after all? It seems there is a downside to seeing everything that goes on under the sun. So in His infinite Capitalisation, He smiteth the varmints and lo, it was better. Or so He thought. While this did indeed alleviate the impending zombie rabbit holocaust down below, now heaven was inundated with the things. Jesus of course was stoked, its well known that prior to his carpentry apprenticeship he had several small pets, rabbits among them, and was considering a career as a vet nurse. Thus heaven becomes cursed with an undead rabbit plague and two out of three aspects of godhead are decidedly unimpressed. It’s at this point that Yahweh decides that he’s had enough and essentially unmakes them. It’s messy as hell and the cherubim are cleaning up the goo for weeks, but eventually heaven is restored to its bleachy sparkle. And again, it is better.

Jesus however is devastated, and gets grounded in his plane of existence for 3 millennia after a big argument with dad. But Jesus is a thinker too, so he sends visions of rabbits to St. Paul. Unfortunately Jesus also has a good memory so he remembers seeing the crispy zombie bunnies. This gets interpreted by St Paul (who never actually met Jesus) as chocolate rabbits. Let’s not forget that Pauly was getting an abundance of hallucinations at this point and it’s impressive that he was able to get so close to the mark. So Paul of the mentally unbalanced Saintness institutes the production of chocolate rabbits as being metaphorically representative of Jesus in some way that makes sense only to him and then only occasionally. Most people like chocolate though, so they go along with it, and this is in fact one of the early incentives to attend his rambling psychotic breaks slash ‘sermons’. Immersion is after all, key to a good story though so it’s no surprise he did so well in the end.

And there you have it- the cosmic truth about bunnies, chocolate, zombies and why a group of rabbits is also known as a ‘trip’.

Please address any article ideas and love letters to Zen beatitudes, I look forward to you christian forgiveness.

We hope you've enjoyed our nineteenth issue of Hell's Bells. Nations interested in contributing to future issues should contact The Stalker for details.

Important Note: In payment for having enjoyed our Newspaper you are expected to up arrow this factbook. Failing to up arrow this factbook means you are willing choosing to forfeit ownership of your soul to The Stalker for all eternity instead. Thanks for reading.