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I'm a lifelong atheist and have never been shy or fearful about "admitting" this, but the reaction to such an admission greatly depends on where I'm living. In Europe or where I live now (Seattle), a shrug, mostly. Occasionally though, fear. Recently a woman of my acquaintance invited me to a service at her evangelical church and when I said I was an atheist, she looked at me as though I had just confessed to being the Green River Killer. This actually makes me laugh, and didn't make me feel oppressed in the slightest.
When I lived in Texas, though, I was often asked where I went to church, and when I answered truthfully, received reactions ranging from disbelief ("you're just angry with God"
to contempt and outright hatred ("you're going to Hell, and I'll be laughing at you when you do" . I'd receive odd phone calls at home and strangers would attempt to change my mind. My in-laws, to this day (25+ years later), think I might as well be Ted Bundy and are terrified of me. Still, at no point did I feel oppressed, but then I'm fortunate enough to be self-sufficient financially and indifferent to the opinion of others.
I imagine it's quite different for people raised in religious households who leave the faith, however. I've heard of many a case of teenagers literally being kicked out of the house without possessions and shunned by their entire family. I can certainly imagine a reluctance to admit atheism in those cases, especially in those pre-internet days when those kids might feel they were the only ones in the world to feel that way. Oppression is not overstating their situation.
I'm not much of a rally-attending person normally, but my wife and I attended the planned-parenthood rally in DC 8 years ago. I thought long and hard about the Reason Rally in DC, but ultimately couldn't fit it into our schedule. As atheists we're notoriously difficult to organise, aren't we? ("herding cats" and I'm a bit fearful this rally will backfire if it's only sparsely attended.
