As a resident of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the North of England, I get more upset when I see conspiracy and woo being demonstrated in my home than when I see it elsewhere. I know that’s irrational, but like many other places, Geordies are a fiercely proud lot. We love our city, we take delight in showing it off, and anything that does it dishonour is something to rally against.

We have our fair share of reiki, psychics and the occasional public protest against vaccinations and 5G, but when I learned that The Great Resist conference was going to be hosted right here, just on the other side of the River Tyne, I was both appalled and excited. I know many skeptics have visited events like this before, and listening to their experiences has always provided a fascinating insight into the often-dangerous subjects being discussed, and the people who discuss them. However, I had always wanted to see what they were like for myself, so I snapped up a ticket; the £9 fee seemed quite the bargain.

I bought it under a pseudonym, partially because if they were Googling names, they might find mine and link me with Skeptics in the Pub Online or Newcastle Skeptics, but mainly it was because I just felt really cool saying I was going undercover. Ultimately, it was important to me that I was able to blend in and learn, to be able to have conversations with people, not debate with them. I didn’t go to persuade anyone they were wrong, or debunk; I wanted genuine conversation, not an argument.

Back to Basics

This was the 4th Great Resist conference, which they call “the people’s answer to The Great Reset”, this time with a focus on “Getting Back To Basics”. To the untrained eye, the lineup of speakers and talk titles might look quite innocent. For example, Kimberley Isherwood with Taking a Primary School Class, Mark Byford with Farming or Famine and Mark Edwards and Jason Davies with Keeping the UK United. Who could possibly take issue with such seemingly innocuous subjects like that?

In an interview a few weeks prior, the organiser, Liz Phillips, told us this conference was going to be different, it was going to be much more interactive and “not just us being talked at for 5 hours”. But, spoiler alert: it wasn’t interactive, and they did speak at us for five hours; in fact, it was closer to seven hours.

The actual conference was fairly standard in terms of structure. The host, Liz, would introduce the next speaker(s), and they would come on stage to excited applause and three or four very yappy dogs barking. It was unclear if the dogs were happy or upset with the content of the conference. The presenters would then talk about their chosen subject, usually with very little structure, but always with Liz running the slides from her ancient laptop (for the tech folks out there, it was running Windows Vista.) I had not realised there were so many ways to run Microsoft PowerPoint incorrectly.

The Venue: No Champagne, Just Cheap Drinks and Theories

The chosen venue was a pub in Gateshead called The Teams & District Social Club. Many people in the UK will be familiar with this kind of venue, perhaps more so if they live in the north. They are social hubs for local folk to get together, have a pie and pea supper with a pint, maybe play some bingo or watch the ‘turn’. They are known for being cheap to visit and often run down, because they exist in deprived areas. You probably won’t find a bottle of Champagne at one, but you will certainly be able to grab a pint of stale beer for a fraction of the cost of a city centre bar. This club was no different, right next to a motorway, through an underpass with a questionable aroma, and in a very deprived part of town.

We were later asked to offer thanks to the venue manager for letting us use their function room, as they were sympathetic to the cause (cue cheering and applause) and reminded that a previous event was shut down in Liverpool (cue booing).

The Faces in the Room

The conference was fairly well attended, with around 80-100 people in attendance. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the people I spoke to were friendly, excited to be part of something, and were sporting all kinds of slogans on their clothing. One gentleman’s blindingly bright white hoodie exclaimed in bold black letters that he was UNVAXXED, UNMASKED and UNAFRAID. Another chap was wearing a peculiar necklace, which, at first, I thought was a remote-control key for a car, as it had a flashing blue LED. But when I asked about it, he shouted at me, “These are bullshit detectors!”

For a moment, I thought my cover was broken and he’d immediately seen through my ruse. Should I have worn a fake beard? Thankfully, he laughed and said he was joking, pointed to his wife, who was also wearing one, and told me they were to “protect them from radiation”, and that they “absorb negative ions”. He went on to say he was a former street protester but had become jaded with the loud and brash nature of how the demonstrations had become. He said they were “too angry” and “nobody listened any more”. I don’t think he intended to be quite so pithy when he said, “I prefer the carrot of conversation instead of the stick of shouting at people.”

The only person who didn’t seem to be in a good mood was a chap who I later found out considered himself to be a sovereign citizen. He seemed pretty angry about recently being arrested and kept in a jail cell for 18 hours, apparently without food and drink, despite the police officer assuring him he would be given something that would satisfy his keto diet.

One stark observation I made was I was one of the youngest people there. I’m in my late 40s, so that’s no small feat, but perhaps it is indicative of the type of people who can fall into conspiratorial rabbit holes. The people I spoke to were mostly retired or out of work; one gentleman was even quite surprised at me asking what he did for a living before telling me of a string of businesses he had run throughout his career, and how he had done quite well until his wife had a stroke and things began to decline.

The theme of past trauma did seem to be a common one, and folk were seemingly quite keen on talking about it. It was enough to make me wonder if those more extreme life events were triggers for conspiratorial thinking, and if these conferences were perhaps a form of perceived group therapy. It turns out, there is research out there that suggests slipping into conspiracism is an adaptation to historical trauma.

The Content (or lack thereof)

It’s difficult to write anything about the actual talks. Much of the content was the usual repeated misinformation, misrepresentation or misunderstanding of data, and long, meandering rants.

After the (delayed due to technical issues) introduction, and a shout-out to the Metric Martyrs of local fame, the conference was opened by Godfrey Bloom, who talked about the treasury and finance, a dry way to start any conference. He continued to say how the UK was in huge debt with many unemployed, including “millions and millions” of illegal immigrants. Putting aside the misuse of the word “illegal” here, UK Government statistics tell a different story; in the year ending March 2025, there were 44,000 irregular arrivals detected. Bloom then claimed we have until Easter 2026 for the current government to collapse.

Next up was the Bowler Hat Farmer, Mark Byford, but this was a prerecorded video only; it seems he was not the only speaker who found the North East a little too far to travel to. We learn that “solar panels are suicide”, this year will be the last full harvest we will ever have, and in the future, we will have no more avocados “because of carbon”. Much of his talk, however, seemed more like an advertisement for his farm shop.

Kimberly Isherwood and Lucia Thomas then came on to talk about sex education for children. Throughout the talk, they showed us copies of the school curriculum from Wales and were determined to tell us that educating children about their bodies was akin to sexualising them and encouraging them to engage in sexual activity. Of course, even a cursory glance at research tells us that sex education significantly reduces adolescent pregnancy.

The one bit of interactivity we were promised before the conference came when they gave us a diagram of a body, to pair up with the person sitting next to us, and point at where we like to be touched. The elderly gentleman beside me did not want to participate, but more on him later. They went on to talk about sexual abuse and how teaching children the same words for genitalia gives paedophiles a “password to consent”. They also were the first to bring up gender as an issue; transphobia was a common theme at this conference.

Then we had Neil Petrie to talk about Direct Democracy, or at least we were supposed to, but he was ill. Instead, the replacement Allan Shipman made a valiant effort to take up the mantle. He started by asking us if he should do 15 minutes instead of 30 so we might get a break, to which the audience gave an emphatic “yes”, which he then ignored and did his full slot saying “that’s democracy!” He talked about his attempt to run as an MP, though his 28 votes were not enough to get him elected. His talk was littered with some topics you may be familiar with: Andrew Bridgen, The Light Paper, Brexit, and Nigel Farage, all of which were roundly applauded.

Perhaps my favourite talk of the day was the gentleman who was previously sat beside me and refused to tell me where he wanted to be touched. He was Rev. Philip Foster, and claimed to be well-read on climate change. He is a retired Church of England vicar who was wearing a delightful white suit and fancy tie, and despite his beliefs, I liked him a lot. Opening with a quote from the Psalms, his talk was a remarkable mishmash of unrelated data and claims. At one point, I had to stifle a snigger when he said, “Coal exists because back then, fungus hadn’t been invented yet.” I’m sure he misspoke, but given the extremely religious nature of his talk, perhaps it was his god who was the inventor.

Other facts included that cows don’t emit methane via flatulence, car dealerships are fined £15,000 for each car they sell that isn’t electric, and CO₂ is not a pollutant, but actually a life-giving gas (the BBC does not understand this), and you can tell this is true because roadside verges are covered in grass. He also managed to sprinkle in a little more religion and, of course, some more transphobia.

Next up were a trio of speakers to teach us the dangers of 5G, ULEZ and 15-minute cities. First was Nicholas Martin who gave a machine-gun approach, starting with “I’m not a conspiracist” and darting around topics such as RFK Jr and Trump, nanotech in vaccines, transhumanism, and how Gorbachev was a nice chap, then getting more insidious with torus quantum fields used as mind control, and how 5G is the linchpin for the World Economic Forum to monitor and control us all. It was at this point that I was wondering if this was a brain dump or a filibuster.

The second of the trio was Gateshead native Mark Steele whom I was most excited to see speak live. He is well known locally for pestering the local council about the dangers of 5G, to the point that he has been given an injunction to stop him from harassing staff. Disappointingly, however, I found his talk to be a tedious, long-winded series of misrepresented technical diagrams and jargon, delivered with a self-congratulatory smugness.

Finally, Eileen O’Connor spoke about the Radiation Research Trust and more dangers of 5G, in particular a group called SCRAM – Seriously Concerned Residents Against Masts. She continued that 77% of people will become ill due to masts and how DNA damage from 24 hours of mobile phone usage is the same as receiving 1600 x-rays at a hospital.

Frustratingly, we still had more to go, and despite already overrunning by an hour, they pushed on. Ray Savage talked about policing and how we should “bring back the old bobbies”, as current police recruiters want 5% of new members to have “psychopathic tendencies”. We were interrupted by a tech audio problem, and when we got going again, we were treated to more references to former British MP Andrew Bridgen and Robert Malone, both notorious antivaxxers. It was at this point that many people’s phones were sporadically making noises; perhaps they were just as desperate to go home as I was.

Sadly, we could not go home yet. The penultimate talk was by Mark Edwards and Jason Lloyd Davies, one of whom was wearing a British flag as a cape. Thankfully, they were brief and to the point, inviting us to consider a united UK. And the last talk, another prerecorded video, this time by Richard Vobes, on getting back to basics – finally, we were going to address the theme of the conference! Sadly, it was another dry monologue, and perhaps if we weren’t all so exhausted, Richard’s charismatic style might have held more interest.

The Silence after The Echo Chamber

Some things stood out to me. First of all, most people on stage had something derogatory to say about trans people. Sometimes it was hidden in a sly side comment, but mostly it was just outright, explicit transphobia. It’s almost impressive that trans issues can be linked with climate change, ULEZ and farming.

The other standout for me was how receptive people were to the ideas being presented. As long as the concept didn’t match conventional or mainstream thought, it was applauded and cheered, and the crowd didn’t seem to care to apply any critical thinking to anything presented.

The content was undeniably harmful, especially for anyone lacking a critical mindset. On the surface, it echoed fear and misinformation, but dig just a little deeper, and it quickly fell apart. I’m grateful I could attend the conference forearmed with a skeptical toolkit, fully aware of what I was stepping into. I’d be interested in attending similar events in the future, mainly for the conversations and perspectives. It’s good to get out of my own echo chamber every now and then. That said, it’s an exhausting experience that is not for everyone, and definitely not something I plan to turn into a regular habit.