It also succinctly defines subgroups of secularism (atheism among them), and advises, "It’s important to approach the questioning student in a neutral manner. As Secular Safe Zone allies, we are not here to push either religion or nontheism."

Bearing such knowledge, an ally posts his sign.

Is This Really Necessary?

A Pew Research Center survey recently found that the number of Millennials reporting doubts about the existence of God doubled in five years—now around 31 percent. More people in the United States identify as nonreligious than any time in the past 30 years; and those numbers are steadily increasing, especially among young people. Is the climate for “coming out” as an atheist still that hostile?

(Pew Research Center)

The SSA acknowledges this data, but Galef counters with a survey by the German non-profit Bertelsmann Stiftung that found that 50 percent of Americans consider atheism to be threatening . As he puts it, “In a society that is still overwhelmingly religious—atheism is on the rise, but the vast majority of Americans are still religious–that puts a religious tint on everything. People still assume that everybody is religious, or that if you're not religious you're not a good person. That's where a lot of the bullying starts.”

Pulliam’s story in Oklahoma is echoed by cases in the news like that of Jessica Ahlquist in Rhode Island—a high school student who challenged a prayer banner in her school and was later called an “evil little thing” by her state congressman—and Damon Fowler in Louisiana, who got his school to cancel plans for a prayer at his graduation ceremony and was kicked out of his house by his parents.

"Sometimes the bullying is active and intentional," Galef says, "but a lot of times it’s passive assumptions that atheists are bad or immoral. And those assumptions filter into their language in hurtful ways.”

Galef shared with me some of the anonymous feedback on discrimination that he has received from a few of the SSA-affiliated student groups around the country.

While most of our campus is respectful, people are typically shocked to find out we are atheists. When we first formed the group I received death threats through email and also the typical ‘you're going to hell’ rhetoric.

We've had our flyers torn down and defaced on a regular basis. Additionally, we've had Christians attend meetings to tell use we're going to hell, we need Jesus, we're seeking truth and they're there to provide it, etc. We finally had to kick them out and almost had to call public safety because everyone was so uncomfortable. Additionally, almost all of our group members have faced harassment from family members, ‘friends,’ and others on a personal level.

Our administration put up a huge fuss when we started this group. They progressed to ignoring our requests for school wide announcements, calling President and Vice President out of class for discussions, refusing to answer our questions, and docking our teacher sponsors evaluation so low that she would lose pay. We also had almost 100 signs torn down with little to no administrative response, even after we requested it.

We get threats written on flyers and [are] generally harassed.

Our flyers have been torn down. Our members have been insulted. However, school administration is very supportive of our organization and backs us when these things happen.

Extremely religious students have harassed some members in the past about their involvement and have occasionally removed promotional flyers from hallways.

The whole school, teachers including, have a slanted view of the group and some of the more judgmental religious people here have harassed the open minded religious people who just like to come to meetings. Everyone assumes it's the ‘atheist club’ even though we have a good mix of atheists, Christians, and people who are just curious. The Christians that are interested in discussion and debate are criticized for even being involved. The harassment is just the verbal attack of the group, nothing physical, thankfully.

The Secular Student Alliance is quick to reprimand schools that illegally discriminate against student groups. SSA began on college campuses and continues to have fewer issues at that level, where it’s usually expected that there will be a secular student group. “We see a lot of pushback and stonewalling from administrators at the high school level,” Galef says, "which is flatly illegal. But that’s why we’re here: to send polite phone calls and emails– and eventually less polite phone calls and emails–to remind them about the Equal Access Act. Secular student groups can’t be discriminated against based on their viewpoint; they can’t be required to jump through hoops that other groups don’t have to jump through.”