If these two paragraphs........................

.....catch your attention, you will find this essay very interesting.  Us history majors also enjoyed being reminded of some very early American history.  Good stuff.

"This is a key difference for "new atheists." To us, the fight against religious ideology isn't a struggle against human rights but a struggle for them. Human beings have rights and are entitled to respect. Books and beliefs don't and aren't."

"For the fast-growing secularist/humanist movement, criticism of religion isn't a demonstration of bigotry but a struggle against it. To us, bigotry against bigotry isn't bigotry, and intolerance of intolerance isn't intolerance."

A tip of the cap to the Mighty E.