The Pi Perspective: Week 3

At Pi Online, we are a massive group of editors who work together to curate content for the website. But who are we really? What do we like, dislike, observe, think?

Each week, we’re pulling back the curtain with a new editorial spotlighting what’s been on our minds.

Editors-in-Chief

I have never once questioned how I would get home from dinners, house parties, or ill-advised nights out undertaken purely ‘for the plot’. Neither at dusk nor dawn, nor at that post-club hour where time stops meaning anything. Somewhere, somehow, I know there will be a bus, a tube, or an Uber five minutes away, waiting to usher me home. I know there will be a kebab shop, fluorescently lit and reassuring, staffed by smiling Middle Eastern men ready to hydrate and nourish me back to life.

London, famously, is not a city that stops. People speed-walk with purpose, allergic to small talk and eye contact. It’s busy, it’s loud, and it does not pause for pleasantries. But in a city that never sleeps, someone is always awake with you.

The late-night TfL crew, Uber drivers, and takeaway workers are the reason I’ve never had to think twice about getting home well fed and safe. So next time you’re slumped at the back of a night bus or clutching your post-club meal like a lifeline, it might be worth remembering the people who make that possible. A thank you goes a long way – especially at 2am.

News

As the world around us becomes increasingly digital, I’ve been witness to countless jokes about the use of facial recognition software in public spaces. However, for certain South-London residents, this has become a reality. Just weeks ago, Labour announced plans to install permanent facial recognition cameras nationwide. Now, Croydon, aptly nicknamed ‘Big Brother Town’, has become the first London borough to have such cameras installed.

Public opinion on the new software is split. Although the Met Police claim the cameras have led to ‘more than 100 arrests and prompted a double-digit reduction in local crime’, some residents feel they are ‘dystopian’ and ‘invasive’. Residents of other London boroughs should likely anticipate the met deploying similar technology across the city due to their claimed success in Croydon.

Features

Is Gen Z the ‘boring’ generation? We are accused of drinking less, going out less, having less sex, and generally embracing “being boring”. Living in an all-girl house, lovingly nicknamed ‘The Commune’, I find it somewhat hard to counter this claim. In theory, having six girls in their early twenties with no responsibilities but our uni lectures is the perfect setup for feral nights out that drag into the early hours of the morning. However, recently, a suggestion to go out is guaranteed to be followed by the same debate.

Why go out when it’s cold, dark, and wet? When tomorrow's hangover will sabotage any hope at productivity? When you could have just as good a time at home, wrapped in blankets, with cheap wine and a speaker? Add to that the fact that London nightlife is outrageously expensive (one of us accidentally spent £70 on drinks the other night), and suddenly staying in feels like the smarter option.

Of course, this is usually met with the age-old guilt-laden reminders: we live in one of the best cities for nightlife, we are only young and free once, and this is supposed to be our time to meet new people and make memories. And while all of this is ostensibly true and some of our favourite memories have been made dancing to awful songs on an overly sticky dance floor, we shouldn’t feel guilty for saying ‘no’ every once in a while in fear of being called boring for enjoying a good night in.

Opinion

Zelensky's frustration this week exposes an uncomfortable truth: Europe has become strategically irrelevant. Squeezed between Russian aggression and American indifference, the continent offers neither resistance nor autonomy. Germany dithers over tanks while parsing constitutional niceties. France plays diplomatic theatre. Poland screams warnings nobody heeds. Meanwhile, Trump dictates terms and Putin advances.

This isn't about resources. Europe's combined GDP dwarfs Russia's. It's about will. Decades of outsourcing security to America created a continent incapable of independent action. Too weak to deter Moscow, too fragmented to resist Washington, Europe has become a geopolitical passenger. The harsh truth? The world's wealthiest democratic alliance can't defend its own borders or assert its own interests. That's not partnership. That's dependency dressed as multilateralism.

Lifestyle and Culture

Love Island All Stars is back for its third season, but the heat is decidedly off. Once the pinnacle of UK teen culture, the reality dating franchise has devolved into a parade of botoxed, media-trained wannabe influencers who are increasingly hard to tell apart.

For the uninitiated, All Stars invites past islanders back for another shot at love, though the title feels increasingly generous: surely a true ‘all-star’ dater wouldn’t need a second (or third) attempt? Previous seasons at least delivered iconic bombshells and viral fan favourites. This year, however, ITV appears to be scraping the barrel.

Whilst the cast of this season aren’t exactly household names, the show falls woefully short with its promise of drama. Most contestants already know each other (via DMs, press events, or nightclub kisses) leaving little room for genuine sparks, and creating a slightly incestuous vibe. The challenges lack originality too, recycling tired Truth-or-Dare-style tasks filled with awkward snogging (please turn their microphones off!).

For now, Love Island 2026 feels more like a lukewarm reboot than must-watch TV, but there’s still time to prove me wrong… 

Science and Technology

Science on campus often feels strangely distant, even when it’s happening all around us. Between lectures, deadlines, and problem sets, it’s easy to experience science as something abstract – compressed into slides, equation and exam questions.

As these dreary January days drag on, the Grant Museum of Zoology offers a quiet opportunity to reconnect. It houses thousands of specimens, from towering skeletons to the infamous jar of moles. Almost every student will have walked past it at some point, yet far fewer step inside. Rarely thought of as a place to linger, the museum offers something increasingly rare at a university: the chance to engage in science without an objective.

In an age where science is increasingly mediated through screens, summaries and AI-generated explanations, this kind of slow, physical engagement feels increasingly rare. Museums allow science to be encountered as something material, strange, and occasionally uncomfortable – much like science itself!

As term settles into its familiar rhythm, and January does what it does best, the Grant Museum provides a welcome refuge from both the cold and the curriculum. It’s a place to pause between lectures, warm and dry, and to engage with science without an agenda. Not as content to be learned, but as something material, strange, and worth visiting.

Sports

At just 23, Trinity Rodman has reportedly become the highest paying female footballer this week. After signing a new contract with NWSL side Washington Post, Rodman is set to be earning $2 million (£1.48m) per year. While this fee is huge, compared to the salaries earned in the men’s game, this amount is almost laughable. The highest earning male footballer remains to be Cristiano Ronaldo, who takes home an estimated $280 million annually from his club, Al Nassr. While this could be put down to the large amount of money available in Saudi Arabia, reports show that the average annual Premier League salary in men’s football is just over £3 million. This is more than double what the world’s best-paid female footballer receives.

This disparity is often justified by the claims that men’s football simply generates more money than the woman’s game. While this is partially true, this argument denies the deeper issue. Women’s football has historically been denied the same level of investment, media coverage, and investment as the men receive. Lower wages are not the cause of reduced interest, but rather systemic failure. While women’s football has grown in recent years, especially last summer with the consecutive win of the UEFA European Women’s Championship by England’s Lionesses, there is clearly more help that needs to be invested into the game.