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Thank you for your comments; I enjoy the exchanges.
It's not important whether I agree or disagree with the NPC way of doing things. The sorority system is long established and extremely successful.
It's fascinating though to see the difference in thinking between men and women. you give the example of NPC (or PanHel) knocking the Porsche sorority down to Cadillac status at the same time trying to raise the Yugos up to be viable. I cannot imagine the shrieking and threats that would ensue if the IFC tried to tell the Porsche fraternity that they had to reduce their numbers and aggression so they would be "brought down to be the same" as the other chapters. Men are very heriarchical by nature - we want to win and to defeat the competition. Women are very cooperative by nature; they instinctively want to find a middle path to benefit everyone.
There are disadvantages to both approaches. Men and fraternities are (as you pointed out) willing to let the weak die and the strong prosper. In a fraternity system, an aggressive fraternity can raise its status through successful competition in rush, sports, etc. The system's weakness is the looseness of the overall fraternity structure. Rush numbers from year to year can be erratic.
Sororities have a very tight structure that ensures good rushes year after year, and evens out the impact in down times. A bad effect of the sorority system is that this rigid rush structure means that a weak sorority cannot get better - it only rarely if ever happens in a big system. We have a very strong sorority system here, yet we've lost an average of one sorority every four or five years for decades. Some sorority always fits the profile of the weakest sister (no point in detailing that here; everyone understands it). They hang on for as long as they can, but it's terribly difficult for them.
I do understand the differences, and it's interesting to see how single-sex fraternities and sororities handle their business.
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