What is a pink elephant? Kids Social Science Q&A

The term ‘pink elephant‘ is used to describe something obvious and uncomfortable, but which nobody wants to talk about. At the workplace or in business communications, it is something that is buried under the carpet when things go wrong. It refers especially to a situation of unhealthy relationships between women colleagues — one woman may try to bully the other women out of rivalry, to stay in control. Broaching such a topic may be embarrassing to all, so it is called a “pink elephant in the room”. The premise of the term is that no one can miss a pink elephant, but pretend to. The term was, until now, more commonly used to talk about a person getting so drunk that he / she “saw pink elephants”, taking off from the animated character Dumbo (a Disney movie) who saw pink elephants.