Sonia Sodha

Observer columnist Sonia Sodha never shies away from controversial subjects, but what really sets her columns apart is her ability to make technical areas of law, policy and medicine effortlessly accessible, and to think outside familiar frames of reference to bring fresh and nuanced perspectives to our readers that they can’t get elsewhere. Agree or disagree, you always learn something new from her columns, and gain an appreciation of how much is missing from the black-and-white nature of so much social media commentary. She has become a leading centre-left voice on identity politics, the ethics of life and death issues, and free expression. Sonia also contributes analysis to a diverse range of broadcast, from ITV’s This Morning to the Radio 4’s The Moral Maze.

The first column we have submitted is her latest column on the issue of assisted dying: a subject Sonia has been writing about well before it was recently catapulted to the top of the political agenda. Many portray this as a relatively straightforward ethical issue, but Sonia has set out why it’s in fact one of the most complex moral questions of our time. Her writing on this issue has been cited by MPs in Westminster debates, and several parliamentarians have told her it has influenced their own views. This column is a critique of the reductionism of the campaign for assisted dying and the inadequacy of the process parliament has set up. As a result of her work on subjects like assisted dying and surrogacy for the Observer, Sonia has been commissioned to make a forthcoming major series for Radio 4 on the politics of life and death issues.

The second is on the practical difficulties of steering a course through the right of students to protest about Israel’s actions in Gaza while challenging the rise in antisemitism on British university campuses. Sonia argues that framing this purely as a free speech issue misses a key question of culture: how people with diverse and strongly-held perspectives can respectfully coexist in pluralistic institutions, preventing those perspectives curdling into something uglier.

In recent years Sonia has become one of the UK’s most authoritative commentators on sex and gender and the last column is on perhaps the most fraught aspect of this most fraught of societal debates: how doctors should best support gender-questioning children. Sonia demolishes the British Medical Association’s rejection of the Cass Review, subjecting it to the scrutiny its governing body denied its own members the chance to apply. This was a column widely read and circulated by doctors and health professionals as well as lay readers, and helped generate the momentum behind a letter to the BMA from senior doctors objecting to its stance.

As this selection of pieces shows, Sonia’s columns are unmissable for readers who want to go beyond the tribal allegiances of social media to comprehend the most