Latino USC father encourages parents to teach their children about social justice

For the Aguero family, activism runs deep.

Lazaro Aguero recently went viral on social media for showing up to one of the  University of Southern California pro-Palestine protests where one of his children is a student, and also for bringing along his 89-year-old father, Manuel Aguero. 

Aguero recalls that his passion for activism was instilled in him from a young age and through several generations in his family. If the protests they attended as a family weren't about teachers rights, they were about access to clean water or any of the other number of issues the Indigenous communities have struggled with historically.

“My grandmother died only recently, but she attended protests with us until the age of 113,” said Aguero. 

He began his activism journey alongside his parents. They taught him to fight for indigenous sovereignty and advocacy for human rights issues. 

“I come from a family where my mother was a housewife and my father was a professor,” said Aguero. “My dad was always very closely tied to the teachers unions in Peru. He was always fighting for their rights.” 

Lazaro Aguero migrated from Peru to the United States when he was 16 years old, leaving behind his homeland and the indigenous community he had grown up around. 

“If you spoke in support of teachers rights, you were labeled a terrorist and they would jail you and then go after your family,” said Aguero about his home country. 

He continues the family tradition of being an activist, by teaching his children about social injustices, including what is currently happening in Palestine.

He works toward honoring that courage for resistance and liberation that his family has fought for, by passing that on to his three children who are seven, 20, 20 and 25 years old. Aguero said he also includes his nieces and nephews, who are young children, to also advocate for the liberation of Palestine. 

For Aguero, freeing Palestine is not only a humanitarian issue , but also an environmental issue. As an indigenous descendant of the Quechua nation of Peru, Aguero believes in the duty of being an advocate for the land and for the people. War takes a heavy toll on the environment with production of weapons and the use of them on land.  People also become displaced from their homes. This displacement in turn spurs migration patterns, causing further polarization. 

According to the European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations, there are over 100 million people who are forcibly displaced due to war. This figure does not include the amount of people who are killed or wounded as a casualty of war. 

Aguero said parents need to teach their children about human rights issues and how they affect everyone. 

“I’m talking to you parents,” Aguero said. “If you don’t have humanity in you, what are you teaching your kids?” 

Aguero believes that his Indigenous background is grounds for his continued activism in favor of the pueblos that are currently under oppression. 

“The struggle I lived in my country, is what they are similarly going through now,” said Aguero. “There were so many problems [in Peru].”

Though Peru declared its Independence from Spain in 1821, then fully gained the title in 1824 after the Battle of Ayacucho, Peru’s Indigenous nations were still under attack. In 2019, Peru experienced a constitutional crisis when their former President, Martin Vizcarra, dissolved the Congress of Peru, creating a self-coup. This issue continued into 2022 with the Peruvian self-coup attempt by Pedro Castillo. 

“Students here and now, have the responsibility to inform their misinformed parents,” said Aguero. “I urge students to persevere in their efforts to inform their parents.”

Aguero, member of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, urges students to show their parents the connection between Latino issues, their immigration status and what is currently happening in Gaza and Rafah. 

He said both situations in Latin America and Palestine are human rights issues caused by politics, imperialism and colonization. 

Many of the parents whose children are out protesting for a ceasefire and for a free Palestine were displaced and had no choice but to migrate due to war and genocide in countries like Peru, El Salvador, Venezuela and Guatemala. 

In these instances, indigenous sovereignty is under threat, land is stolen and many innocent civilians murdered by the state. 

“We protect each other,” said Aguero into the loudspeaker at the protest where he made headlines. “Un pueblo unido, nunca será vencido,” he chanted. 

Aguero recently spoke with Serpentina Sanchez, coordinator of Seeding Sovereignty’s Community Care Program, over the collective’s Instagram Live. The meeting centered around Aguero and his long-standing battle with transnationalism and colonialism in his home country and how that influences his passion for protesting for the liberation of Palestine.

Seeding Sovereignty is a multi-lens collective working to radicalize and disrupt colonized spaces through sovereignty work, community-building and cultural preservation. 

The collective hosted a similar plática with Aguero on Sunday, speaking specifically to Spanish-speaking and immigrant parents. This plática was designed for students and youth to learn how to engage with their parents in conversation about Palestine, without the language barrier. 

“Algo que [los inmigrantes] hemos aprendido de los Estados Unidos al decidir vivir aquí, nos han pintado a nivel mundial una imagen de que los Estados Unidos es el país de la libertad y la democracia,” Aguero said in Spanish. “Y yo solo estoy ejerciendo ese derecho.” In other words, Aguero said he believes that on a worldwide level, the United States is marketed to immigrants as a country of liberty and democracy. He only wishes to exercise that right as a citizen. 

His advice to parents is that they should listen to the youth about the struggles they face, leaving behind the fear of losing out on jobs and other opportunities when speaking out against Israel’s actions. 

“Dejar de tener miedo,” Aguero said in Spanish. “Nunca vender nuestra conciencia por nada, eso es lo principal,” which translated means “Stop being afraid. Never sell our conscience for nothing, that is the main thing.”