Turns out, in my experience, that it is better to admit to being a pedophile than an atheist. I mean, who amongst us has not heard this, "You are an atheist? Huh, I thought you were so nice." Even my best friend from college asks me, "How do you not murder rape and steal?" Then I have to say things like, "Why do you scare the crap out of me by saying things like that?"
They are WRONG, you are RIGHT, they are overgeneralizing and trying to scare you with their own beliefs. Being Agnostic or Atheist in NO WAY makes you evil, not at all, you are entitled to your opinion, and it shows you are independent thinker, not pre-programmed by other "sheeple"!
Over here in the UK, it really isn't a problem. In fact, it is very rare for religious people (street preacher nutters excepted) to talk about religion much at all.
Yes, in my former job I had to go to the UK a couple of times a year and I noticed that there was a profound difference in how the non-religious are seen in the U.K.
Certainly in the area where I live and within my social group (including my workplace, a school) religion is the exception not the rule.
Morality is learned just like anything else in society. The problem happens when people are force fed morality from one source, usually the Bible. The other issue there is that even the Bibles morality is flawed on top of the fact that most of it is copied from older sources like Egyptian mythology and numerous other religions that came before the Bibles existence. I trust an atheist more than a Christian because the atheist has actually THOUGHT about what morals they follow and why.