The rise of the internet and social media has been an incredible gift for the world of journalism — and a terrible influence on the important work of covering American politics.

The last presidential election cycle saw the rise of the mantra “Twitter is not real life,” implying a sort of rare self-reflection — or accusation, depending on the messenger — that social media posts and digital fervency are not reflective of what the average voter thinks or how the average candidate will perform.

Since then, calls for politics and campaign coverage to be less terminally online have largely been ignored. Major outlets and mediums are often still guided by a “who’s up or down” ouroboros that cycles through horse-race snapshots shaping punditry shaping opinions shaping the horse race.

2024’s presidential contest will likely be a rematch between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. Control of the White House, Senate, and U.S. House will center around an identifiable handful of battleground states and districts. Both factors make this the perfect time for a new mantra imploring more political coverage to “touch grass.”

Being told to touch grass can be a tongue-in-cheek encouragement to disengage with the online world and focus on the physical one — or, more commonly, an insult denoting a particularly internet-addled take or perspective divorced from reality.

The conditions for next year’s election cycle are ripe for political coverage to “touch grass” by spending more time reporting on people, issues, and outcomes that exist in reality — or run the risk of being a derogatory punchline that misses things at best and misinforms at worst.

Probable electoral outcomes and theoretical voter reactions to key issues can be dissected ad nauseam, through voting data, polling results, and yes, social media interactions. But there’s something to be said about examining those maxims through more coverage of actual people.

Humans are complicated creatures, and often hold conflicting viewpoints on issues up and down the ballot. Relying too much on covering those viewpoints through a two-dimensional binary, filtered through online-dominated bubbles, can distort what’s actually going on.

Take a recent poll from The New York Times that found a percentage of respondents who said they would vote for Vice President Kamala Harris but not President Joe Biden. A raft of followup coverage — dominated by too-online strategists and pundits and talking head cable shows — pontificated about the impact those numbers could have on an election more than a year away.

But reporters with the Times actually called to follow up with some of those voters and found “many of them expressed different opinions during the follow-up interviews than they did during the survey.” These voices don’t undermine trust in the survey collection and results, but by “touching grass,” they better highlight the context and variability within the snapshot of voter sentiment — and leave the reader better informed.

It’s not just coverage of polling that could use a detox from digital echo chambers. For example, some recent data points that show the strength of the overall U.S. economy come as many Americans nonetheless have negative views about its health, expressing concerns about their personal circumstances. That contradiction in views has led to “befuddlement, exasperation and curiosity on social media and in opinion columns,” as one recent Associated Press report notes — while also taking a “touch grass” step of talking to voters who explain how, despite rosy figures from economists, they’re feeling the squeeze of higher costs.

There’s value to be gleaned from having near-instantaneous access to a wide swath of people eager to share their opinions virtually on virtually every topic. But an overreliance on what buzzes in online circles that skew towards certain voices could lead to another presidential cycle where political journalism feels stuck in the mud.