New Zealand's first flat earth conference (opens new window) has just been hosted, last Saturday in Auckland. Around 30 "flat mates" crowded into the Backyard Bar's function room to listen to conversations about how the earth is flat, including live streaming of speakers from overseas.
A reporter from TVNZ attended the event and noticed something interesting that appears to be common to flat earth groups - a very religious undercurrent.
The flat earthers in NZ appear to be organised around a public Facebook page (opens new window):
Posts in the NZ FB group include one asking if there are any Atheists among the 700 members - answers are mainly no, with the occasional yes and proclamations that people won't remain atheists for long after they become flat earthers. Another post has a picture someone took out the window of a plane, describing it as showing a flat horizon. In that thread it's mentioned that there's a regular flat earthers meeting, presumably in Auckland, and that they'll be performing a laser test of the earth's curvature soon.
A third post talks about how people tell their family that they believe in a flat earth. Suggestions include being up front and telling family that you don't want to hear any negative feedback, appealing to their common sense ("do you feel like you're on a ball spinning at 1000mph") and explaining it to them by showing them that the sea is flat.
In response to a question about whether aliens have anything to do with the flat earth, one person responded with a single sentence:
"Fallen angels aka Nephilim and their blood lines that have spread around the world and influence heads of the top central banking elite families who control governments of the world under the guise of the NWO - check out The Jesuit Order, The Black Nobility... there are so, so many, those are just some of the European ones; there are secret orders around the world that pull the strings of the highest power within this corrupt fake ass society that we have been indoctrinated into from birth."
I really, really want to get to one of these flat earth meetings, and will have to look out for the next one.