I would rather say they dismiss it as dangerous overall. Religion is many things, and some of the things are good: it provides community, a sense of perspective above the rat race, and an answer to the questions that don't really have answers, like "why are we here". But to do so it requires obedience to a lie, and there are those who believe that truth and reality are too important to allow a comforting lie to have primacy. For them, religion is not worthless, as in "having zero worth": it's worth less than nothing; it's harmful. I can see both sides, but I think I agree with the idea that ultimately it's easier to provide community and consolation to an atheist than to replace the understanding of reality that most religions deny to their adherents.

That is flat out untrue. All of the people you quoted are well aware that religion provides some value/worth alongside the costs. They're all highly intelligent people who are able to perform basic cost/benefit analysis like the rest of us.

What's the difference between an "atheist" and a "new atheist"? I've found that religious people use "new atheist" almost as a derogatory term, but I just don't get where the insult is supposed to come from?

[edit] Ah, I looked up "new atheism" on wikipedia and got: "New Atheism is the name given to the ideas promoted by a collection of 21st-century atheist writers who have advocated the view that religion should not simply be tolerated but should be countered, criticized, and exposed by rational argument wherever its influence arises."

It's a bit of a signal in some religious/evangelical language. "new atheism" implies a few things - there's a renewed urgency, an implied "new" "attack" on religion, etc. It's not meant as an insult so much as a buzzword to signal to the faithful that there's a 'new' menace to ward against.

Also, 'new' atheism is viewed as actively oppositional - loud, proud, 'coming out' in public, etc. Being aggressively atheistic is a hallmark of those labelled 'new atheists'. It's probably more accurate to refer to this more aggressive public movement as antitheism, but that would be another label/word which would confuse people. Putting 'new' in front of the old word, I think it becomes easier to rally the troops, so to speak.

"It's probably more accurate to refer to this more aggressive public movement as antitheism"

I disagree that this "movement" is aggressive. It is only perceived as aggressive because people are not used to having their religion publicly questioned, and held to the same standards of rational scrutiny as other products of human thought. I also disagree that it is "probably" anti-theist. The "new atheists" sometimes ridicule theists, but concede that merely believing in a personal god is fairly harmless in itself. I think they are definitely anti-dogma.

Hitchens seemed pretty anti-theist, and I don't recall him ever saying that belief in a personal god was "fairly harmless".

I was using 'aggressive' from the perspective of those using the term 'new atheist' - should've been more clear on that. I don't think 'new atheism' is 'aggressive', except to the extent that it's being vocal vs 'in the closet' year ago.

Richard Dawkins calls himself a "cultural Christian" and agrees with teaching the Bible as a literary/historical work. I'm not too familiar with the beliefs of the others you mentioned, but Dawkins certainly does not dismiss religion as _worthless_. Unless you define religion as "willfully acting irrational" or something.

Not even just 'worthless', there's a growing anti-theist movement. Whether those above are a- or anti-theist, I can't say for sure, but anti-theists would claim religion is not only 'worthless', but indeed actively harmful to people and society.

Sam Harris believes in experiential religion - that is to say that he's had mystical experiences/unitive states of consciousness. He writes about the importance of spirituality(or esoteric Religion) in contrast to literalist, dogmatic religion on his blog.

Rational, literal, dead religion is often harmful but mystical, experiential, living religion is quite the opposite.