No, I'm not talking about the illegal kind of "breaking and entering" in this Hub. Instead, I'm going to talk about the breaking into and becoming a part of established social groups, and the difficulties that newcomers often have.

Through the majority of my life, I can't exactly say I tried very hard to be a social butterfly. I had my few friends, my tight-knit group, and most of us became friends by chance rather than through any actual effort. None of us really cared about social validation of being with the so-called "cool" and popular crowd.

But when I started spending more time online, I really started to notice how hard it could be to become a part of an established community. Unless I happened to be lucky enough to be there at the beginning of the community's creation, or be introduced to others by someone who was already a big name within that particular community, I spent weeks and months being an outsider, feeling as though I would never be anything but a tagalong, someone who participated but would never really be known or appreciated the way a lot of the long-time community members were.

It was discouraging, and more than once I gave up trying. I grew discouraged rather quickly with the sheer amount of effort I had to put into the attempt at being known for my own efforts and merit rather than just being another nobody floating through that tiny corner of cyberspace.

It happens everywhere, both online and in real life. A person can't just walk up to a crowd of people and be instantly accepted. The social group won't allow this to happen so easily. Most of us have an urge to band together, to create groups of like-minded individuals, to establish ourselves through the people that we associate with. If I associate with intelligent people, then I too must be intelligent. If I hang out with writers, then I feel more like a writer myself. It's something we use to help define our own personalities.

The downside to this is just how hard it can be for an outsider, a newcomer, to break into the group and start the same process that we so often take for granted. That person can't name-drop the way others can. They can't share in the in-jokes. And thus they sometimes have to work harder than the people who are already established as community members, to distinguish themselves from every other new person and hopefully stand out enough and gain enough respect to hopefully eventually be counted as one of the 'inner circle'.

Depending on the kind of group and the level of elitism and snobbery that exists, there are usually a few kind souls who will do their best to support newcomers that might fit in well with the group, who will encourage and support them and say to others, "Hey, [big-name person], see what this new guy's done? Isn't it cool?" This kind of support can be essential to newcomers who may be a little sensitive and fragile.

Of course, there are also people who will exclude rather than attempt to include. The kind who will see something substandard, that the group may not have much interest in, and reflexively shun the newcomer, casting them out before they had much of a chance to step in. In some cases tough love may be necessary, but not all of them, and it's been my experience that the more 'elite' the group, the less likely they are to try and include anybody new in their circle.

I'm thankful that I haven't seen much of this behaviour here on HubPages. There are plenty of big names here, (names that I would love to eventually be included among, if the truth be told), but I have yet to see any real jerks who seem to thrive on keeping their site as 'newbie-free' as possible. We all have to start somewhere, after all, and most if not all social groups tend to thrive if new blood is included every once in a while.