I have a theory about why this functional atomization has become so popular: small design topics (functions, classes) are easy to talk about so the various wannabe OOP gurus like Robert Martin keep talking about them the most, becoming more and more extreme to the point that we end up with hundreds of one line functions which can only really be put together in one way so that they fulfill the arbitrary criteria of reading like prose.

This is an excellent example of local optimizations - i.e. local design optimizations - which end up harming the overall design and maintainability. You've discovered this yourself, but still cling to this dogma of tiny functions.