Philip Eil
Columbia Journalism Review
Providence, RI, United States
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Past articles by Philip:
What the Trump administration meant for freedom of information requests
The election of Donald Trump promised an epic test for the Freedom of Information Act. On one side, the powerful, yet deeply flawed, transparency law that turned 50 years old a few months before Trump’s 2016 election. On the other, a brash, dishonest, norm-flouting billionaire who had spent his adult life working in a privately-owned […] → Read More
The Worst Effects of Online Death Threats Are Things No One Can See
"I confined myself in my home for nearly a month. I lost half my hair and gained 20 pounds.” → Read More
The Secret Lives of People Obsessed with Going Deep Underground
There's urban exploring, and then there's the primordial obsession with going way below the Earth's surface. → Read More
How to criticize the press—responsibly
We live in a moment of extraordinary tension between the press and the public. Donald Trump’s knee-jerk retort of “Fake news” is now a particular favorite of dictators and authoritarians around the world. The prevailing anti-press animosity at the national level has trickled down to local reporters, the Associated Press reports. And it’s not just […] → Read More
Bloody Strikes Created the America We're Now Losing to the Super Rich
Here's how hard workers had to fight to have a semblance of dignity in a country obsessed with the gospel of frontier capitalism. → Read More
An ode to reporter’s notebooks
Ten years ago this month, I became a reporter. In April of 2008, I was a 23-year-old recent college grad working at a soul-stifling corporate marketing job and feeling increasingly terrified of a life filled with spreadsheets, menial tasks, khakis, and meetings with unclear purposes. Since enrolling in a night class on creative nonfiction a […] → Read More
5 ways journalists can regain trust from readers
Journalists overestimate how much Americans know and care about journalism. The general public doesn’t care as much about press freedom and the First Amendment as we hope. They don’t know as much about the basic principles of journalism as we assume. And they sure as hell don’t trust journalism as much as we would like. […] → Read More
An elegy for alt-weeklies, as ‘smart, gutsy, colorful’ voices are silenced
THE OREGON-BASED ALT-WEEKLY Willamette Week recently published a piece explaining why its 2002 article, “RUBBISH! Portland’s Top Brass Said it Was OK to Swipe Your Garbage–So We Grabbed Theirs,” went viral more than a decade after its publication. In the post, web editor Elise Herron explained that the piece first gained traction in a Reddit forum […] → Read More
How to Argue Online Without Losing Your Shit
Anger and electronics are both stimulants. → Read More
Sometimes Depression Means Not Feeling Anything At All
Not happy. Not sad. Just nothing. → Read More
The lesson journalists should take away from Spicer’s rebranding
Last week was a triumph for the rehabilitation of Sean Spicer’s image. On Wednesday, Harvard University announced that he would be a visiting fellow, and later that day, he appeared in a lengthy—and mostly friendly—interview on Jimmy Kimmel Live! A few days later, on stage at the Emmys, he smiled his way through a cheeky […] → Read More
Being a Journalist is Terrible for Your Mental Health
"It felt like the parts of my brain that contain motivation, energy, and the ability to arrange ideas had been injected with novocaine." → Read More
What It's Like to Join a Revolution as a Five-Year-Old
Peter Andreas's memoir 'Rebel Mother' relates an incredible childhood of communes and coups across the US and Latin America. → Read More
The ‘Written Inside’ Podcast Offers a Unique Perspective Inside Prison Cells
A new podcast tells the stories of long-serving inmates who stay sane by playing cardboard pianos and killing roaches. → Read More
Lessons Learned from Investigating Your Mother's Brutal Murder
Leah Carroll's mother was strangled to death by a mob-connected drug dealer, and her dad succumbed to alcoholism. Now she's telling their story. → Read More
Watch Paralyzed People Control Machines With Their Thoughts
And feel a little better about the world. → Read More
Chelsea Manning commutation won’t save Obama’s transparency legacy
Transparency has long been a part of Barack Obama’s political identity. He talked about it on the campaign trail in 2007. He talked about it on his first full day as president. He talked about it in his 2015 State of the Union. He even mentioned it in last week’s farewell address. But many of […] → Read More
The Corruption Podcast America Needs Right Now
The new podcast 'Crimetown' is about how public officials abuse power and enrich themselves, and seems especially timely now that Donald Trump is about to take over the White House. → Read More
Remember, America: Hating the press is not American
Journalists in the US are never off-limits for criticism. But what we’re seeing right now goes too far. We must fight back. We must fight a president-elect who obsessively attacks the press on Twitter, fight death threats toward... → Read More
Remember, America: Hating the press is not American
Journalists in the US are never off-limits for criticism. But what we’re seeing right now goes too far. We must fight back. We must fight a president-elect who obsessively attacks the press on Twitter, fight death threats toward... → Read More