But if gambling is not legal in your country, that means they can not gamble in public.
There some gambling practice that are not legalized in some part of the country, but I believe gambling like sport betting is legalized in every part of the world. But however, on e of the reason why most people tend to hide to gamble is because those addicted gamblers has really passed a negative information about gambling to the general public such that most persons might notwant to regarded as an addicted gambler and may decide to hide to gamble, as for me I don't give a fuck about what people may say am a proud gambler and I know my limit so there is no point for me to hide to gamble.
Even if they hide their involvement in gambling, believe me that eventually it will all be revealed, and yes it is true as you said that some other gamblers choose to hide their gambling activities, namely because now the public's viewpoint has become very bad towards gambling as well as the gamblers involved, the reason is clearly because they don't want to get a lot of negative criticism from the public, And regarding whether you should hide your gambling activities or not is actually up to you, after all this is a choice and if indeed so far you have not experienced any problems or disturbances even though you do not hide your gambling activities then yes continue, because the point is yes as you said that as long as we are able to take care of ourselves properly in the sense of managing our gambling according to our abilities then we will not experience any adverse effects.