Mob mentality is such a drag. It seems that in Japan a lot of the social construct is based on the premise that an individual really wants to know they belong to and are under the protection of a group. So punishment for someone with those beliefs is to be excluded from their group. It's the same mentality that filters down to the school yard bullying level in Japan, which is usually not one strong kid against a weaker or "different" one, but can often be more like everyone pretending the bullied kid doesn't or shouldn't even exist.
Some of the reasons behind this extreme bent for cliques and membership and the agony of being left out started to come clear when someone explained to me about mura hachibu. Back in the old days in Japan, if someone went against the rules of the village everyone agreed not to interact with that person. But hachibu means 8 parts, or 80%. I just found an explanation online in Japanese that explains that the 80% refers to the fact that the rule breakers or other assorted weirdos were not completely banished from the village but they were denied in eight of ten categories that comprised the village. Others interacted with them in case of fires and funerals, but the outcasts were denied assistance with or involvement in coming of age celebrations, marriage, construction, (treatment of ill) health, natural disasters, travel, childbirth, and protection against "bad luck years" (yakudoshi).
As for me, if I was offered a deal like that I'd just leave town and start over somewhere else rather than think all that ostracism was worth dealing with because if I died or had a fire they were going to take care of me. Screw begging for crumbs. I'd rather take care of myself.
It's all a tariki/jiriki issue at heart. Those are some terms I learned from a class on Japanese Buddhism at UH. Tariki means "other power" and jiriki means "self power". I think ultimately a balance of both is the best way to go, but not being able to be part of the crowd has never (since around the end of high school anyway) bogged me down. I am a native of a state whose motto is Live Free or Die-- now that seems like damn good common sense to me.