In our society I feel we act as a whole with a distance between the hidden and the manifest. What I mean by this is that in the U.S. we have a democracy, and each person has their own opinion and rights. Those individual opinions may be overshadowed by the entire population, or simply by those who cast their votes during elections, and those who are vocal through interest groups. The distinction between hidden and manifest here is that the manifest is what is portrayed in the media about our government, and the public issues, and the interest groups focused on those issues. The hidden aspects of our society are all of those independent views of each person, and the entire truths behind everything portrayed in the media.
There are many things that are portrayed in the media from several different angles. This allows us to see many sides of the same story, but it is still difficult to always get the entire story. These clouding of stories allows for overseeing all the truth that is available, so making it more hidden. That goes as well for all the individual ideals and opinions, not because they don't matter, but simply because each individual idea is not strong enough to gain attention. This is not an intentional hiding of the basic diversity in our nation, but there is just no way to represent every individual, so they may fall to the side.
The interest groups and political policies, the media and the public policies represent our nation, and therefore, they are the manifest parts of our nation. These parts are more recognizable to other nations looking in on us than those individual aspects. Also, the things that are readily available for the public to see shape what the public thinks about, so manifests itself more. Therefore, in our society the manifest is not what the whole population chooses to show, but what the voices for the population choose to show, such as foreign policies, and the ways in which public policies are affected. The hidden aspects of our society (like how many people or different groups of people view a particular issue) are not necessarily intentionally hidden, but are covered up by the more general aspects of the media and voices of the political parties. This gives the hidden side the quality of desiring to have the manifest, but it does not have the power to take over the manifest.
