A fair trade

"I've got just the place for low-cost housing. I have solved this problem. I know where we can build housing for the homeless: golf courses! It's perfect! Just what we need. Plenty of good land, in nice neighborhoods, land that is currently being wasted on a meaningless, mindless activity engaged in primarily by white, well-to-do male businessmen who use the game to get together to make deals to carve this country up a little finer amongst themselves.

I am getting tired, really getting tired, of these golfing removed in their green pants, and their yellow pants, and their orange pants, and their precious little hats and their cute little golf carts! It is time to reclaim the golf courses from the wealthy and turn them over to the homeless! Golfing is a arrogant, elitist game which takes up entirely too much room in this country. Too much room' in this country! It is an arrogant game on its very design alone, just the design of the game speaks of arrogance.

Think of how big a golf course is - the ball is that fucking big! What do these pin-headed pricks need with all that land?! There are over seventeen thousand golf courses in America, they average over one hundred and fifty acres a piece - that's three million plus acres, four thousand, eight hundred and twenty square miles - you could build two Rhode Islands and a Delaware for the homeless on the land currently being wasted on this meaningless, mindless, arrogant, elitist, racist, there's another thing; the only blacks you'll find at country clubs are carrying trays.

And a boring game. A boring game for boring people. You ever watch golf on television? It's like watching flies fuck! And a mindless game, mindless. Think of the intellect it must take, to draw pleasure from this activity: hitting a ball with a crooked stick and then, walking after it! And then, hitting it again! I say pick it up asshole, you're lucky you found the fucking thing! Put it in your pocket and go home, you're a winner! You've found it! No chance of that happening. Dork-o in the plaid knickers is going to hit it again and walk some more. Let these rich removed play miniature golf! Let them fuck with a windmill for an hour and a half or so! See if there's any real skill among these people.

Now I know there are some people who play golf who don't consider themselves rich. FUCK 'EM! And shame on them for engaging in an arrogant, elitist passtime."

-George Carlin

https://youtu.be/Z4w7H48tBS8?si=NboUfVzXMBGJD0C4

Even better is when they destroy a bunch of virgin land to make a course when courses are already overbuilt in the area, then close it.

I lived in a city that had a mayor who was elected to a few terms and was going on 10-11 years in office. An out-of-state developer wanted to turn 400 acres of old growth forest by Lake Superior into a golf course, spending about 25 million. For some reason he made this basically the only thing he tried to get to happen in his last 2 years in office. This was also at a time when a lot of courses were struggling or closing because they had built too many in the early 2000s.

Many people were opposed to it but the usual sort of people thought it was great because 'wow someone is spending money'. One fairly dim guy I knew who worked in construction said "YEAH. Do you know how many jobs that will make??". The problem is they were going to hire a bunch of people to build it, which would take about 6 months, and then the permanent positions at the course were going to be like 6 people. Finally, they didn't do it, the mayor left office, and basically nobody ever talked about it again.

We should just have forest golf. Plant crap tons of trees and make golf actually strategic

I played golf for the first time recently, it's not as boring as it looks... basically a fun way to be outside with friends and do something challenging.

The course I played on maintained the local geography and incorporated it into its holes. That made for a gorgeous landscape, and, as an example, one hole required a shot over a forested ravine, both a tricky shot, and a nice way to keep the natural landscape, flora, and fauna as intact as possible.

I confirmed that they only use non-drinkable water for irrigation, and there were no vast spans of grass, only patches that used to be empty land beforehand. That only made the course more challenging.

All in all, what I'm trying to say is that this sport can be done in a way that's overall fine. Sure, replacing native flora with grass isn't good but it's ok if done in small patches and responsibly. Golf has become a symbol of classism but it's something anyone can enjoy if they have access to it, it isn't even particularly expensive. It isn't great but, done morally, isn't bad either.

And there is a risk in making it a symbol in that way: it makes for a wrong target and a waste of resources. Activists filling up holes makes a point but there's much more important stuff to do. If you're an environmentalist or an urbanist, cars and oil companies should be pretty much your only concern; golf courses can be dealt with later.

Fishing is a way more boring sport, but at least it takes up literally 0 land.

Screw ball golf, disc golf though solves all it's problems

1. Can play in almost any environment so no habitat destruction needed. Might have to clear a few trees or brush in dense forest but otherwise mostly keeps forests intact
2. No elitism or arrogance. It's one of the cheapest sports there is, just requires a couple $15 discs and most courses are free and are part of parks. Not much maintenance is needed on the course.
3. Easier to pick up. Most people can at least throw a disc 10 yards or so after a couple tries. Also more forgiving if drunk or high in that way.
4. More interesting to watch /play. Courses usually have obstacles like trees and the flight path of discs has a lot of lateral movement so if your good/lucky you can weave it through the obstacles.

Destroying the land isn't really the issue, they choose flat terrain to avoid having to do the work. It's the irrigation cost of keeping the greens functional in environments the grass isn't suited for that's the problem.

Most boring sport to watch

Not a fan of the proper game but I do enjoy the driving range. I know some people jokingly say 'just play minigolf' but that's missing the 'punt a tiny thing really fucking far' part.

I like golf.

It's super challenging, which I find fun. I like that I can slowly get better at it and watch myself progress but probably never really master it. Plus, it's a really great way to get outside and do something with some friends or even some strangers.

I hate the elitist, racist, and sexist origins of the game but, like all bad ideas they're becoming extinct. Sexism and racism have been pretty much eradicated from the sport compared to the time of it's inception.

I play on courses that are reasonably priced and open to anyone and I have plenty of options. I'm not even remotely wealthy and neither are any of the people I play with. Equipment can be expensive but it doesn't have to be.

Almost every passtime requires some space and often some level of infrastructure needs to be built and maintained. Think about swimming pools and hockey rinks, not to mention giant stadiums built for only a few professional teams to play in. Hardly anyone is mad about those things, and the list goes on.

I get hating the rich. I get hating something because it's perceived as something that only rich people do but that's not really the reality here. Sure, rich people play golf but only about a quarter of courses are private so maybe there are actually way more poors like me playing. What do you think?

Disc golf > ball golf. Don't need a perfectly manicured unnatural lawn for disc golf, in fact that makes it a lot less fun.

this made me realise rich people started playing golf because they wanted to flex how much land they have

Yeah. Golf just doesn't make sense 😕.

I fucking hate golf, and golf courses for this reason, HOWEVER they do make a somewhat useful end land use in reclaimed landscapes in urban areas (closed landfills for instance). I don't get the need for greens etc. the original game started out on some Scottish moorland or glen, with native grasses.

We need a separate planet for these people

Golf is actually fun.

"sport".... If 90 year old Trump can play it it's not a sport 😂

What about a hyperspace bypass?

"You've got to build bypasses." - some earthling

I hate golf for reasons above, but I recently tried Top Golf, and if there is any sustainable future for the sport, that's it.

A single fairway can serve ~100 tees with probably 500 people playing. And some of the games are super accessible to people of lower skill levels. We played a round of Angry Birds at a work party where the virtual targets were only maybe 25-30 yards away. Super fun.

Just gonna say that golf is fun but I never played the real thing since it's expensive, just golf videogames, minigolf is the one that I think it's boring.

I used to think it's boring. I still do, but not so much ever since I learned it was invented by the Scottish.

Falling down - golf course scene

Golf > Baseball

Still beats taking open space and paving it over for some sprawling cookie cutter development

This meme, minus the analogy, is what Leo Wong did in Futurama lol

Still better than tennis

This is just someone hating golf lol

At least in my country every city, no matter how small, have some public football pitch. And almost every neighborhood have some mini pitch. I have no data, but I'm pretty sure that football sums way more area around the globe than golf.

Which makes sense since football is fun af

Whites love their monoculture!