Tag Archives: TEDx Provincetown

From TEDx Provincetown – Five Ways to Eradicate the Racial Wealth Gap with Tara Vargas Wallace

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Tara Vargas Wallace, Founder and CEO, Amplify POC

In June of 2022, I was invited along with all the board members of “Gay Sons and Mothers” to attend our executive director’s TEDx Provincetown Talk, “The Mother Factor: Acceptance Works Both Ways.” Link to my blog about that talk.

But I also was treated to seven additional diverse and impactful talks, one of those being the extremely important topic of eradicating the racial wealth gap presented by Tara Vargas Wallace, founder and CEO of Amplify POC, which advocates for racial justice and economic development of People of Color in the Cape Cod, Massachusetts area.

Tara started her brief talk with an introduction of her personal journey, going from a homeless teen with a child living in the Bronx to becoming a social worker and becoming aware of the impacts of systemic racism.  (See my blog on personal and institutional racism)

What is the Racial Wealth Gap? It is the difference in wealth between groups of people based on race and ethnicity. Harmful American policies over the past decades have severely disadvantaged Black and Brown Americans, making it nearly impossible for them to build generational wealth. According to Federal Reserve Bank statistics, white households currently have 8 times the wealth of Black households and 5 times the wealth of Brown households. Long time policies of redlining (a loan practice which made it much harder to obtain mortgages in minority neighborhoods) and gentrification (which pushed minority families out of affordable housing) have resulted in these drastic gaps in generational wealth accumulation.

So what can we do to address this injustice? Tara challenged us to practice “wallet activism” in terms of how we make, spend and invest our money and offered five practical suggestions:

Tara Vargas Wallace speaking at TEDx Provincetown


1) Advocate for substantial national investment in Brown and Black communities

2) Push for improving housing policy, especially addressing the negative impacts of redlining and gentrification

3) Expand access to entrepreneurship. Make it much more easy and fair for Black and Brown owned business to obtain loans and investments

4) Support and patronize Black and Brown owned businesses regularly

5) Vote for candidates who support public policies to remove these economic barriers, including updated federal guidelines for contracts with minority owned businesses.

This is certainly a systemic long-range wrong that needs to be corrected by sustained action. Tara ended her talk by encouraging us to spread the word on this issue.


Here is a link to hear the seven minute recording of Tara Vargas Wallace’s talk.

“The Mother Factor: Acceptance Works Both Ways” with Rick Miller, Gay Sons and Mothers

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It was wonderful to meeting some of my fellow “Gay Sons and Mothers” board members in person!

NOTE: link to view this referenced TEDx talk is at the bottom of this blog.

I am honored and pleased to now be serving on the board of a relatively new nonprofit, “Gay Sons and Mothers,” founded by Rick Miller, a psychotherapist, author and public speaker. Gay Sons and Mothers is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that chronicles the complex emotional bond that exists between gay sons and their mothers. The project was begun by founder Rick Miller in 2016 and Gay Sons and Mothers was formally organized in December of 2018.

Through interviews and the use of multimedia, Gay Sons and Mothers documents personal stories about the defining qualities of this unique relationship. We highlight how this special connection has the power to increase the overall acceptance of gay sons and their families, communities, and peers. Do read my initial blog introducing this organization.

In June, 2022, Rick invited all the board members to attend TEDx Provincetown, where he was one of eight inspirational speakers on a wide range of fascinating topics. In addition to hearing Rick, it was great to meet several of my fellow Gay Sons and Mothers board members in person.

Rick Miller giving his talk at TEDx Provincetown

Rick’s talk was titled, “The Mother Factor: Acceptance Works Both Ways.” What is so fascinating is that Rick is perhaps the first person to do extensive research on how a mother’s role is so critical to every person’s life, even as adults.

Here are some key points from Rick’s talk:

A mother is the person who has the greatest impact on her gay son’s psychological well-being. The main trait in healthy gay men is that they had mothers who just accepted him and let him be who he wanted to be. If that meant playing hopscotch or loving to wear glitter, she didn’t stop him.

Up until the mid to late ’70s, the medical and mental-health communities blamed mothers for “making their sons gay.” Imagine how a mother felt receiving these messages – from her husband, doctor, or clergy back then.

You’d think that mothers wouldn’t accept their sons for being different, yet there were many accepting mothers who simply ignored what they were being told – and privately followed their own intuition.

When a mother is supportive of her gay child, magic happens. Their bond is frequently private, unspoken, and even unrecognized, while they both experience a sense of togetherness.

Rick closed his talk with some important points on how all of us should think of and treat our mothers:


• First, step out of viewing your mother just as your mom. Instead recognize that she is a whole person, and give her the acceptance that she deserves. Instead of focusing on her weaknesses or what she didn’t do, also focus on her strengths and what she did well.

• Then, appreciate that she grew up in her own imperfect world, in a family system with vulnerabilities that existed long before you were even born.

• And recognize that how your mother was parented became the model of how she parented you. Maybe she did the best she could!

• If you want to be fully appreciative of your mother, do your best to let go of your grudges.

• If your mother is still alive, and you both have the opportunity to speak to each other about your experiences, why not do so while you can?

• And if she is no longer alive, remember, your relationship continues inside… and there is no expiration date on acceptance or forgiveness!

In an ideal world, mothers are seen as the emancipators, but now it is up to you- to turn the tables and emancipate her.

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You can now watch the 10-minute talk on Youtube using this link!!