Clowns, it is a weird fear. Yet, they are oddly disturbing.

A wave of creepy clown sighting spans back to late August. According to CBSN, the phenomenon started with children in South Carolina after they reportedly saw a clown trying to lure them into the woods. But those sightings were never confirmed.

Many incidents have been dismissed by law enforcement as pranks. Whether they are pranks, threats or actual sightings, police and other officials have to take them seriously as a potential concern to people’s safety.

Students at Penn State University became so upset that they launched a late night manhunt after a clown was reportedly seen on campus.

According to CNN, people have been arrested. Schools have sent out warning letters. Social media is crawling with homemade clown videos.

The recent fad is disturbing because it’s hard to tell where myth ends and reality begins.

We know, realistically it is mostly a bunch of nonsense, but then someone gets arrested for making violent clown threats and we start to question whether our safety is in jeopardy.

Do not conform to the social norm. The clown panic is another example of mass hysteria and it should be dealt with as such. Robert Bartholomew, a sociologist at New Zealand’s Botany College, told The Guardian that the fear over clowns comes from two things: a fear of otherness and social media.

Social media spreads information and makes people think that the danger is bigger than it actually is. People also feel the need to conform to social norms, that includes participating in a national phenomenon.

This may seem like a funny Halloween prank, but in reality these creepy clowns have caused panic among the community. It’s ok to scare people around Halloween time, but this prank is taking it too far. There are ways to scare people and there are ways to terrify people. This prank is a prime example.