Most importantly, because God says it is! 1 Timothy 5:2 tells us to treat the younger women "as sisters, with all purity." In context, it applies to how pastors should appeal to people instead of just rebuking them. But I think the idea goes beyond this. F'r instance, Jesus says that whoever does the will of His Father in Heaven is His brother and His sister and His mother. God is our Father, and we are siblings of Christ -- certainly we are siblings of each other. (Though we often forget, especially when it comes to Guys and Girls).
I should just quote my book at you, since I've written about it before. I wrote this about 1 Timothy 5:2, and why it is terribly important to be a godly brother:
It seems like very good advice to me, so I recommend it to all men in their friendships with women, not just to pastors in their ministry. There may be a better idea, but has anyone ever thought of it? Is there any alternative relationship that is safer, more encouraging, more honorable, more permanently good? I cannot think of one, so I will continue to speak of your Christian female friends as your sisters.
Along these same lines, it has been my experience that girls have a great need for good brothers. A young woman is beset on all sides by powerful and discouraging forces. Every day, the world challenges her to prove her worth -- acceptance based on performance or appearance. Criticism comes quickly, while approval comes grudgingly and with ulterior motives. From within, she is assaulted by emotions, fears, yearnings, and sins. Satan's legions (if you will take the spiritual battlefield seriously) are eager to trap her or destroy her. And always she must beware of evil men. These are the *minimal* trials of her life. She cannot expect it to get much better than this, and she can expect it to get much worse (through specific difficulties, like illness or an unloving family or any string of peculiar hardships).
It is easy for her to doubt her value. It is also easy for her to feel alone, threatened, or hopeless. It is easy to be confused. Now, women are not helpless or friendless, and God's mercies are new every morning. I am not trying to paint a picture of despair -- I am only saying the trouble is very real. We are blessed people in a cursed world.
Those are her troubles. You must also be reminded of her value. There is, and will only ever be, precisely one of her. She was made to be exactly herself (and may fully become that, some day, as God is still working on her). Most importantly, she is worth no less than the death of God, because that is the current bid for her soul. I could never have time enough or words enough to really describe the miracle that is a woman of God. She is intrinsically beautiful and you should honor her because she is a lady. There are no exceptions to this rule -- in difficult cases, you must simply be a better gentleman.
(In case your head is full of stuffing, I feel compelled to point out that honoring a lady does not mean indulging her. If she is being stupid, honor may very well require that you not humor her).
-- from "The Art and Science of Finishing Last", by lil' ol' me
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