The Black Cats went into the clash with their local rivals at St James' Park on a good run of form, having been hard to beat all season.
But they were torn apart by a rampant Magpies side as Kevin Nolan hit a hat-trick and Shola Ameobi scored twice, with Darren Bent's late goal little consolation.
Asked if it was his worst moment in football management, Bruce told Sky Sports: "In football management? Probably in my career, I would have thought.
"It's still trying to sink in what we have just witnessed. Everything that could go wrong on the day went wrong. Penalties, red cards, poor defending.
"Rolled into one it's been a disastrous afternoon. We have to hold our hands up and say we were well beaten.
"To come here and play like that, it's not acceptable."
Bruce kept faith with the young side that had been playing so well in recent weeks but concedes that with hindsight he might have opted for more experience.
"We were naive and I don't think we handled the occasion well at all, especially in the first half," he said.
"There were too many on the fringes of the game and to rely on three or four in a derby game against Newcastle is not good enough.
"We are young, we do make a few mistakes and we will learn from that. There are a lot of 19 and 20-year-olds.
"You always learn from the real beatings you get and we are all hurting badly."
Bruce also accepted that he could not grumble about any of the refereeing decisions, with Nedum Onuoha conceding a penalty for a foul on Jonas Gutierrez and Titus Bramble later shown a red card.
"I have no complaints about anything. We were second best from the moment the game started to the moment it finished and we can't argue that we were well and truly thumped," he said.
"We have to take our medicine and try to repair the damage of what we have done."
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