The legal reason not to consider this hazing is that many hazing laws require the activity to occur in a student organization; some laws go so far as to require the organization be school-recognized. If what you're saying, Honeykiss, is that under those laws this is not prosecutable, you are absolutely correct. I was wrong earlier when I said it didn't have to be a structured organization.
If we decide to limit our use of the word "hazing" to the legal definition, however, then violent gang initiations are not hazing either, since gangs are definitely not school-recognized.
More colloquially, I think hazing is used slightly more broadly, and I would include this high school assault in that slightly broader definition. No one else need accept anyone else's colloquialisms, of course, but I do think that from the other responses here that many people accept a wider definition of "hazing" than just violence pertaining to school groups - as most of us called gang initiation hazing. I don't think that for most of us the intent of calling this hazing is to whitewash the serious of what occurred, double entendre intended.
Here is one anti-hazing law; it happens to be West Virginia's but is very similar to most states'. The behavior described in it is similar to much of what occurred in the high school incident, but the unsanctioned powder puff game would not qualify as "any organization operating under the sanction of or recognized by an institution of higher education."
Hazing" means to cause any action or situation which recklessly or intentionally endangers the mental or physical health
or safety of another person or persons or causes another person or persons to destroy or remove public or private property
for the purpose of initiation or admission or affiliation with, or as a condition of continued membership with, any organization
operating under the sanction of or recognized by an institution of higher education. The term included, but is not limited to,
any brutality of a physical nature, such as whipping, beating, branding, forced consumption of any food, liquor, drug, or other
substance, or any other forced physical activity which could adversely affect the physical health and safety of an individual or
individuals, and includes any activity which would subject the individual or individuals to extreme mental stress, such as
sleep deprivation, forced exclusion from social contact, forced conduct which could result in extreme embarrassment; or any
other forced activity which could adversely affect the mental health or dignity of the individual or individuals, or any willful
destruction or removal of public or private property: Provided, That the implied or expressed consent or willingness of a
person or persons to hazing shall not be a defense under this section.
*just edited to add that some laws are considerably broader, such as Arkansas' - see
http://www.uca.edu/divisions/student/greeks/hazing.htm
