And risk management.

That is not true across the board.

There is a family line for the GLOs that establish family bonds with each other at the chapter and/or local/regional/district/national/internatonal levels.

Protecting single-sex status IS risk management, i.e. not leaving yourselves open to getting slapped with a discrimination lawsuit is one way to manage risk.

Yes, but it's not the only risk management item associated.

The whole "all dogs are animals, but not all animals are dogs" type logic equation.

It's the not the biggest risk management issue, though. I'm not convinced that these informal cross-GLO little brother and little sister arrangements are a real threat to single-sex status. (Actual little sister orgs, on the other hand . . . .) Besides, in these instances, a lawsuit would have to come from someone who is already a member of a (single-sex) GLO.

The real risk management issue, as I see it, is that a non-member could be seen to be acting on behalf of the GLO in some capacity, so that a GLO could find itself liable for something a non-member did.

No, the thinking is that, if my org has "big brothers", then we can't systemically deny men bids, so the suit would come from, for example, a man who went through recruitment and didn't get a bid.

Is that a really risk? Well, I don't know, because I'm pretty sure it's never been tried in court. In fact, I think it seems a little far-fetched, but it was definitely cited by my HQ as the reason we weren't supposed to have "pledge dads", and the reason that our house sweetheart was supposed to be off-the-record.

I see. Thanks. And I certainly don't mean to be arguing with anyone's HQ or risk management policies.

Every sorority has good looking women! I just feel pissed by the fact that my Big is sort of telling me who to pick!

So he is trying to tell you who to take as a little SIS not as a little brother. It's none of his business. Tell him that he needs to know his place.

If you are comfortable discussing and able to do so, I am curious about the bolded part above. Was any specific reason(s) given by your HQ as to why a house (by house you mean chapter?) sweetheart should be “off-the-record”?

Many NIC/IFC fraternities have sweethearts and are quite open (press releases, on websites etc.) about it. At no time are the sweethearts considered members of the fraternity and I don’t recall any concern about the single sex status of the fraternity by having a sweetheart.

Oh, I take that back. A single sweetheart each semester (or year) was allowed. However, they wanted us to use very specific language in describing him, i.e. he was not, under any circumstance, an "honorary member" or a "Phi Mu Man".

Gotcha. And thanks.

I assure you, this ain't that.