Screams from the Pink Collar Ghetto: Hurricane Katrina and Lebanon

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Hurricane Katrina and Lebanon

I have been back from Lebanon for a week now (with a side trip to Paris and Geneva). This weekend, I watched Spike Lee's documentary on Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans. It was so disturbing. I don't understand why it took so long to help the people in the Superdome. Having watched the 1 million displaced in Lebanon receive help and assistance and then watching the government fumble about in New Orleans was shocking. I want to write more about this but I'm tired and my brain is foggy.

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What is a Pink-Collar Ghetto?

Pink Collar Ghetto describes women stuck in certain jobs, mostly low-paying and usually because of their sex. “Pink Collar” denotes historically female jobs like maids, secretaries, waitresses, and nurses. "Ghetto" is where marginalized people are forced to live.

I chose this title for my blog from a book I started to write when I was 22 and working in South Carolina as a bartender (barmaid according to my mother) and a receptionist/ temp. As a feminist, I was worried that I would never break out of the pink-collar ghetto. I read Barbara Kingsolver's book "The Bean Trees" and it inspired me to leave SC and go back to school.

Now I am a feminist humanitarian working on gender-based violence in humanitarian settings. It's been a long way from that pink collar ghetto in South Carolina but I never forget my roots.