Dear Atheists, please shut up

USA Today features a terrible article about the "new" "new" atheists and how they're so much better than the "new" atheists. Yeah, the article makes about that much sense. It's purportedly about Bruce Shieman's new book, An Atheist Defends Religion: Why Humanity is Better Off With Religion than Without It.

The old atheists said there was no God. The so-called "New Atheists" said there was no God, and they were vocally vicious about it. Now, the new "New Atheists" — call it Atheism 3.0 — say there's still no God, but maybe religion isn't all that bad.

Right off the bat there are the typical swipes at the "New Atheists", by which they mean the most well-known modern proponents of Atheism, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens and Daniel Dennett. They're vocally vicious! Oh no!

Faith provides meaning and purpose for millions of believers, inspires people to tend to each other and build communities, gives them a sense of union with a transcendent force, and provides numerous health benefits, Sheiman says. Moreover, the galvanizing force behind many achievements in Western civilization has been faith, Sheiman argues, while conceding that he limits his analysis, for the most part, to modern Western religion.

He neglects to mention the significant downsides in Western religion, of course, and apparently also excludes everyone not involved in "modern Western religion" -- aka the majority of religious people on the planet. And since there is no such thing as a "transcendent force" some of what he says is just nonsense. He also fails to note the very real possibility that without religion, many achievements in Western civilization would still have occurred. Why? Because people are still smart and industrious even without superstition.

"More than any other institution, religion deserves our appreciation and respect because it has persistently encouraged people to care deeply — for the self, for neighbors, for humanity, and for the natural world — and to strive for the highest ideals humans are able to envision," Sheiman writes.

Yeah. Tell that to the victims of fundamentalism the world over. Tell that to women in the Middle East. Christians in Muslim countries. Young boys in the Catholic Church. Atheists in America. Jews almost anywhere.

Having thus praised religion, now it's time for some old-fashioned atheist bashing!

In recent years, the skeptical scene has been dominated by the New Atheists —Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and others — who argue in best-selling books that religious faith is a mental illness, or worse.

Yes, mental illness. We'll just lump them all together, take the worst quote we can find and then pretend that's their entire position! See how easy it is to demonize someone!

"The work that we need to do, we atheists, humanists and non-believers, is to build a better world and not try to tear down those with whom we disagree," said Greg M. Epstein, the Humanist chaplain at Harvard University.

"When our goal is erasing religion, rather than embracing human beings, we all lose."

Epstein argues in his forthcoming book, Good without God: What a Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe, that morality does not depend on a judgmental deity and that nonbelievers can lead meaningful, even purpose-driven, lives. But they can also learn from people of faith, such as California megachurch pastor and Purpose Driven Life author Rick Warren, Epstein says.

First of all, NONE of the atheists are trying to ERASE religion. That's a strawman. What they are arguing is that irrational belief should not be the basis of public policy. That's because you can't come to rational compromise with such beliefs because they are absolute and based on nothing tangible. Also, Rick Warren is a huge dumbass.

The stupidity ends with this:

"There was a moment when atheist books were selling," Dacey said. "But people like objectivity, they like the feeling of balance. So after this wave of atheist books and the criticism that they are extremist, people are trying to find a happy medium."

Ah yes, the "happy medium" where atheists, who have been a fairly quiet voice until recently, should sit down and shut up because they're upsetting the believers by disagreeing with them. If only they could have applied this logic to other minority groups throughout American history!

Here's the thing that none of these "New new Atheists" seem to get. You don't tell the minority to sit down and shut up when you're standing on their neck.