I'm using Hostgator shared as a production environment and I had a problem installing some python modules, after using:
pip install MySQL-python
pip install pillow
results in:
unable to execute gcc: Permission denied
error: command 'gcc' failed with exit status 1
server limitations

no root access
sudo doesnt work (sudo: effective uid is not 0, is sudo installed setuid root?)
no gcc

questions

is there an alternative package for pillow. I want this to use django ImageField. (just like pymysql is an equally capable alternative for mysql-python)
i have modules like mysql-python and pil installed in root, i.e. pip freeze without any virtualenv lists these modules. but i cannot install my other required modules in this root environment and in my virtualenv i cannot install mysql-python and pil. can something be done? can we import/use packages installed in root somehow in a virtualenv?
is hostgator shared only good for PHP and not for python/django webapps. we have limited traffic so we are using hostgator shared. should we avoid hostgator or shared hosting? aren't they good enough for python/django (i had no problems in hosting static/PHP sites ever). are they too many problems and limitations or performance issues (FCGI)? if yes, what are the alternatives?
You need root access to install the necessary packages to run your python application.
PAAS like Heroku are another option but the free package at Heroku is only good for developing your application and it is not intended for hosting it once you get traffic and users.
I strongly suggest you get a VPS at DigitalOcean.com. For 5$ per month you will get root access and more power. You will also control your full stack. I use Nginx+Gunicorn to host about 10 Django projects on DigitalOcean right now.
installing python modules that require gcc on shared hosting with no gcc or root access