Pantsing

Pantsing is the act of pulling down a person's trousers and sometimes underpants, typically as a practical joke or a form of bullying. Pantsing is a more common prank and occurs mainly in schools. Some U.S. colleges before World War II were the scenes of large-scale "depantsing" scraps between freshman and sophomore males, often involving more than 2,000 participants. It is also an initiation rite in fraternities and seminaries. It was cited in 1971 by Gail Sheehy as a form of assault against grade school girls, which did not commonly get reported, although it might include improper touching and indecent exposure by the perpetrators. In contrast to Sheehy's claim, the U.S. National Library of Medicine analyzed the involvement of boys and girls in pantsing in 2013 and found that boys of various age ranges are the victims of pantsing significantly more often than girls. The United States legal system has prosecuted it as a form of sexual harassment of children , and the NLM found that disciplinary actions taken are typically much harsher when girls are the victims.