JUSTICE AT HOME

WRITTEN BY SARAH NEESE, PHOTO BY UCO PHOTOGRAPHIC SERVICES

FOR UCO ALUMNA AND STAFF MEMBER Mackenzie Masilon, advocacy is an essential part of her professional career.

“I was drawn to sociology as an undergraduate student, because I wanted to dive into the root cause of societal issues and really work on helping to change some of the systemic problems our communities face,” Masilon said.

Masilon’s work primarily focuses on the systemic problems of domestic violence and sexual assault. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, about one in four women, and nearly one in 10 men, have experienced contact sexual violence, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetime and reported some form of intimate partner violence.

Beginning as an intern at the YWCA-OKC, the trajectory of Masilon’s career continued in the direction of raising awareness and prevention of intimate partner violence, as she served the next five years at the Oklahoma Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault (OCADVSA).

Through her work at the coalition, Masilon recently helped bring new legislation to light, HB2666, aimed at broadening the reach of sexual assault convictions. The bill states that someone can be sexually assaulted “within or without the bonds of matrimony.”

“HB2666 updates the marital rape law in Oklahoma by removing the requirement of force or violence to occur within spousal rape,” Masilon said. “It was important to make this change, because as victim service providers, we recognize that over half of intimate partner violence survivors report experiencing sexual assault at the hands of their partners. Often times, there is no force or violence used. We wanted the law to reflect what we see in our work.”

Though she no longer works for the coalition, Masilon continues to serve as a contract legislative liaison for the agency and conducts their policy initiatives at the state level.

“I act as the liaison between OCADVSA program members and the capitol, via a contract lobbyist, to ensure our priorities are carried out in the form of legislative action,” she said. “With HB2666, we were able to find support from Rep. Jon Echols, where he agreed to author our bill to help provide justice for all victims of sexual assault in Oklahoma.”

Gov. Kevin Stitt signed the bill into law April 27, 2021, with the law going into effect Nov. 1, 2021.

In addition to her role as OCADVSA legislative liaison, Masilon currently works at Central as a prevention and outreach specialist in the Center for Counseling and Well-Being. She acts as the adviser to the UCO Peer Health Leaders and helps plan programming initiatives on campus that focus on mental health and suicide prevention, intimate personal violence prevention and substance abuse prevention.

“Our office is committing to making UCO and our community a healthy one and utilize students to get that messaging across,” she said.

While she’s made it her career, Masilon believes that everyone can become an advocate.

“I think it’s super important to understand that we are all constituents and have the ability to reach out to our respective lawmakers to support or oppose measures being authorized by the legislature,” she said. “I also think it’s helpful to have a general awareness of how our session works and the process a bill takes to become law. In general, remembering that your voice matters is key.”