Like I said in another post this morning, politicians around the world need to learn that laws that they pass apply to them too.... We are all getting sick of that shit.
If water has to be rationed for drinking, showering, etc. then the grass at golf clubs should be allowed to go dry until the government comes up with an answer to alleviate ALL water rationing!!!
I feel like we're skipping part zero.
Droughts happen, but for a city the size of Toulouse (1m+), I feel like rationing down to one toilet flush a day is a massive failure on the part of French infrastructure.
Same man. Everyone on Reddit always seems to talk about how they only shit once a day or less. I shit minimum 3 times a day. There's no way I'd survive a restriction like that.
It's ez, just don't flush all your shit till the end of the day and let it get nice and hot. Then when the pile of shit gets too high, flush!
Eco Warrior!
We've had decades, half a century at least, of climate warnings. Rio - the first international agreement that "this climate thing is pretty fucking serious and we should all start doing something about it right now" - was over 30 years ago.
The predictions are coming true. And even if by some miracle, the world was carbon neutral tomorrow, things are still going to keep getting worse because of the inertia in the system.
None of this is shocking or unpredictable or coming out of left field. We haven't been blind sided by this. We've willingly, knowingly, consciously, and deliberately spent the last several decades actively making things worse while saying "Yeah, we really should do something about this. It's really serious."
My favorite recent bit was a climate activist calling out I believe it was sky news for decades of news coverage calling climate activist loony. It's baffling that people just aren't aware of how bad it is, and will be because if they knew they'd also be acting just as fucking "loony", it's bad really fucking bad.
Your missing the overarching point, droughts are happening over vast swathes of the world now. Parts in the EU are seeing the worst droughts in decades and obviously here in the US we are getting them too. But for some reason fancy places like these can ignore ordnance because “OuR ClIeNtS MiGhT GeT OfFeNdEd!”
Imo golf courses are a massive waste of space, water resources and money. It’s better to cut down on 75-85% of all courses and turn them into something useful like affordable housing
I’m a golfer and I agree. The game was invented in Scotland where they have no shortage of grass and misty humid air for it to grow. It was never intended to be in the desert (or Florida FFS what a terrible place to play)
EDIT: I wasn't clear---obviously Florida doesn't have water issues, shouldn't have juxtaposed that statement with the desert part. But the kinds of hydroengineering and chemicals they need to make a specific kind of grass grow there causes all sorts of other environmental problems. It's also miserable to play because it's so damn hot and humid
The Nullarbor links is the best way to play golf imho. Each hole is hours or even days apart and there are hazards (inc wildlife stealing your balls) to liven things up.
Come on out to Kansas! I am a member at a sand green course. $5 green fee that goes in an unattended drop box. Drinking is encouraged. Biggest difference than a grass green course is chipping and putting (captain obvious here). Most sand green courses are considered “pasture golf”, so your slice won’t be a big deal.
That's why the state motto is, "Come to Kansas because a tornado flung you into an alternate dimension and you have to fight wizards to get back home, *stay* because of the sand golf."
I like George Carlin's take on golf:
> Golfing is an 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 17,000 golf courses in America, they average over 150 acres a piece - that's 3 million plus acres, 4820 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 and 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 cocksuckers 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 pastime.
As a non-golfer beyond the occasional mess about, that sounds really neat. How do they work, because based on my very limited knowledge of golf and sand usually it’s something you want to avoid?
I used to work at a course with a few sand greens left. It’s just regular old silica sand, they’re soaked with oil and packed. It the oil that makes it work.
Edit: wow thanks for the gold! it’s my first time. Was it as good for you as it was for me?
As a kid I played on a course that had them several times. Once on the green, you roll a path to the hole with the roller tool provided next to the green. You take your shot and then when your done you drag a rake behind you to smooth out your footprints. As a bad golfer, I find them more forgiving on the short game than grass greens.
This is just a small example of the excessive ways the rich is saying we support green initiatives but don’t want to actually want to sacrifice anything
If flushing your toilet is limited to once a day, lawns and courses have got to go. Not being able to flush leaves a health hazard in your bathroom.
Edit: there are a lot of responses defending golf courses, even from a job loss position. There is very little stopping the golf courses from building storage tanks and supplying themselves. This would be the free market solution. Not the golf courses draining the public supply of water.
Edit 2: I won’t be able to get everyone. Do some good for humanity all I ask.
Edit 3: no need to report my comment to redditcares. It’s pretty low, since it is there to help people with mental health crises.
If I was living in an area where we could only flush once a day, but golf courses had the sprinklers going, I’d be leaving more than cement on those courses…
Just shit in front of the sprinkler and let it wash your ass.
Turn off the water while you soap up to save it for the bottling company to sell it back to you please! There not enough to go around!
You were so close.
Shit *on* the sprinkler before it activates. Then when the sprinkler head pops up it will spray through the mound of fences and spread your displeasure across the green.
Bonus points if you leave a note in a plastic bag next to your donation stating that it's human waste and a public health hazard until the green is cleaned.
> If I was living in an area where we could only flush once a day
Please tell me that's one flush per person. How are you supposed to flush three dumps and 3x toilet paper once as a family. Also rip IBS sufferers. This is my worst nightmare lol.
You'd be surprised how common this is. I worked on a golf course maintenance crew for two years. We had to clean shit from the cup almost once a month.
Ugh, dustbowl might be optimistic, firebowl might be the sequel we get. Where I am it’s the worst drought in 500 years me the rivers are running dry, not cool.
Big facts more people need to learn and understand this. I’ll confess I didn’t know any of that until recently when John Oliver did deep dive segment on water out in those states. Certainly was eye opening as most of his pieces are.
A lot of these things are caused by political decision.
There's similar issues with land use subsidies in Europe. Farmers get paid a flat rate to work the land. Conventional wisdom as far back as the 11th century and before is to switch around crops to let the soil regenerate. A big part is to not even work parts of the land at all. Every farmer knows this.
You also don't get any money for letting parts of your land be forested (which helps with wind carrying away soil and water retention and all sorts of stuff). It can even increase overall yield.
But the subsidies keep many farms afloat, so constant use it is.
I'm no expert and had this explained by some farmers, recently, so take it with a grain of salt.
Important to note, though, that this isn't in any way and endorsement for neoliberalism or anything like that. We just need some political pressure to make sure these old laws and regulations get replaced by better ones. Ones that take into account the ecological cost of things.
Any irrigated farm will pump out those sorts of numbers.
They typically irrigate 24/7 with each individual sprinkler head doing 5 gallons per minute.
It's crazy that water conservation laws EVER affect a family before a farmer.
It’s that bullshit “Right to Farm Act”. Essentially, farmers can’t be regulated for *anything*. Water pollution, air pollution, water consumption — they just declare that the government is violating their right to grow food.
Here in California’s Central Valley, the unique atmospheric conditions hold particulates in the air forever, but the air pollution districts can’t stop polluting practices like almond tree shaking or tilling dry soil. Never mind we have the highest asthma rates in the country or that the valley dominates the top 10 list of America’s worst polluted cities.
The highways are littered with bullshit signs that say “Is growing food wasting water?” Yeah, actually, growing alfalfa and almonds in the desert with ancient, leaky irrigation systems **is** wasting water. Thanks for asking.
> Is growing food wasting water?” Yeah, actually, growing alfalfa and almonds in the desert with ancient, leaky irrigation systems is wasting water. Thanks for asking.
Yep. If the government just paid every farmer the full value of the alfalfa crop in exchange for just not growing alfalfa, a ridiculous subsidy, it would save billions of dollars and [basically end the droughts in cali](https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-doing/)
I work for a public water agency that was within 200 days of running out of water last year. We still allowed the 3 golf courses in our area to water greens. Each golf course was using 100-200k per day. They should have been banned I couldn’t believe it.
An often unconsidered consequence is the water agency runs out of money. Water agencies are funded by rates not taxes. They also operate on fixed costs and when water use drops 20,30,40,50 percent so do revenues.
This wouldn’t be a problem if the water agency was owned by the people. Public utilities should be owned by the government profit isn’t the goal when their are no private shareholders to be beholden to.
I first got involved in politics volunteering with the Obama campaign in 2012. I think when I changed broadly from a liberal to a leftist perspective was when I started to realize the answer to questions like, "why don't we just give enough water to the people who need it," was always something to do with the market. Usually something complicated, but something that made sense at the end of the day. The difference between the path I took and me becoming a neoliberal was choosing to give up on the market rather than giving up on getting people what they need.
Edit: ok, I think I see what some folks are talking about with the wording. To clarify, I'm talking about the difference between the path I took and an alternate version of reality where I might've become a neoliberal. I am not a neoliberal.
Wow this is a great explanation of how one can shift perspectives from newfound insights. I wasn’t volunteering but learning more about politics as I’ve gotten older has helped me learn that without being a progressive leftist I would be sacrificing most all of my values. Sadly too many don’t care to learn more or simply don’t want to change their stance on anything.
In areas where eater usage restrictions have been passed, yes. You can be limited to so little water that you can only afford one or two flushes per day.
These water restrictions dont ever seem to be based on any valid metrics, just a percentile reduction on overall water usage for an area and the biggest water wasters somehow manage to get an exemption.
Golf courses should be required to switch over to turf to reduce water consumption. Its not like they dont have the money for it.
>Audubon International estimates that the average American course uses 312,000 gallons per day. In a place like Palm Springs, where 57 golf courses challenge the desert, each course eats up a million gallons a day. That is, each course each day in Palm Springs consumes as much water as an American family of four uses in four years.
https://www.npr.org/2008/06/11/91363837/water-thirsty-golf-courses-need-to-go-green
There's approx. 16,000 golf courses in America, the highest in the world. It's just like asking consumers to produce less CO2 when corporations make up 70% of all emissions.
Easy answer, just give the courses two or three flushes of water a day. They'll either figure out a solution real quick or be out of business.
Either way, reason wins.
> even from a job loss position
There's zero argument from a job loss position: almost every other use of golf-course land would create more jobs than lost.
>flushing your toilet is limited to once a day
Not in the deepest depths of Australian water restrictions in a drought that lasted over a decade did I ever witness that kind of bullshit.
I am involved heavily with national golf administration and I whole heartily agree. Water supply has been identified as an issue for golf clubs here for at least a decade and it is expected that clubs collect and store their own water for this purpose. Relying on town supplies alone is just not acceptable.
Edit: spelling
If we all have to make personal sacrifices to save the planet then IMO it is only fair to start with the luxuries that 99.9% of the world don’t benefit from.
We unwashed masses have had to endure far worse than a moratorium on rolling your fat arse around on a golf cart, across a well curated wasteland. If we can do it without unimaginable amounts of wealth then they won’t have a problem at all.
I work at a pool and the neighborhood has a golf course next to it.
A couple of weeks ago it was raining pretty hard and while it was raining the sprinklers were on and shooting water like a firehose. Golf courses are very wasteful
This is like when Con Ed tries to tell New Yorkers to "conserve electricity" in a heat wave, when all the screens in Times Square are going full blast
(for reference: Times Square uses 161 megawatts of electricity every year. That's enough energy to power approximately 161,000 average U.S. homes and twice the electricity required to power all of the casinos in Las Vegas.)
Fuck that, I'm blasting my AC lol
"While residents cannot water their gardens or wash their cars in the worst-hit municipalities, golf courses have escaped the nationwide restrictions."
"Golf officials say greens would die in three days without water."
And the gardens won't?
Get a water butt if you can. I'm still working through the 440 litres I collect from this year's rain. I've got 2, they cost me £30 each from a local DIY place and took 5 minutes to connect to my downpipes.
I'll also put slimline ones on the front so they're not an eyesore soon.
To clarify some points:
I'm in the UK, we don't have any rainwater collection laws here. Additionally they only fill until they are full, the overflow will continue on its way otherwise.
Some Local councils will supply water butts if you check.
Yes water butt is a genuine term.
This water is only to be used ok the garden. You should look into grey water reclamation if you're after in house uses.
> Get a water butt if you can. I'm still working through the 440 litres I collect from this year's rain. I've got 2, they cost me £30 each from a local DIY place and took 5 minutes to connect to my downpipes.
for other US people this is 116 gallons or ~2 55 gallon drums.
If you are in the US there are actually a lot of places that sell 55 gallon drums for dirt cheap (like $9-$15) that you can purchase and just use for water. Make sure they didn't have anything but biodegradable stuff in them (one place I get them from they had vanilla in them, another is just food stuff but all are clean).
also make sure there are no laws about collecting rain water, yes places that experience constant draughts have laws like that.
You can also set up a washing machine diverter to water your outside tidbits with your machine’s gray water, so long as you use biodegradable detergents. I know there are some DIY kits and professionals that can set it up too; the link is just a general overview. https://modernfarmer.com/2017/03/laundry-garden-irrigate-graywater/
I'll second this. I lived in Texas during a multi-year drought. Whenever a storm passed through, all the dead trees would get knocked over causing loads of property damage, toppled power/phone lines, and tons of erosion.
Australian here, grew up with water restrictions my whole life. Get a big bucket, big enough to stand in. Put it in your shower and use the water you catch to water your garden.
It shouldn't be fake grass either. That shit is made of plastic and will just end up spreading its microplastic disease into every waterway and animal that is nearby.
Fake grass is terrible for the environment as well. It's pure plastic.
Grow something native to your area that doesn't need a lot of extra water and care. Clover for example is a great way to have a deep green lawn and doesn't require much water or care at all. I've heard some people say they only need to mow their clover lawn once a year.
Clover used to be common in lawns, before a fertilizer was developed that killed clover and the company launched a massive marketing campaign likening clover in lawns to being poor and saying that every self-respecting American should have a "grass only" lawn
We’ve got a clover and fescue mix at the moment and my lawn is still bright green despite nearly a fortnight of no rain. The clover suppresses the other weeds too. It’s brilliant.
You can buy microclover/fescue seed mixes on eBay or from seed shops. Highly recommend.
> the clover suppresses the other weeds too
Well that's just bad for business, how do you expect the poor poor corps to sell poison to people if they don't believe they need it?
“But think of the wealthy socialites that will be denied the pleasant views while golfing after bottomless mimosa brunch at the country club! Think of their needs! “ /s
more then that, so what if the grass dies? (btw it wouldn't die bust just go dormant)
I don't think there is any technical requirement for golf fields to have green grass at all. You can play golf on yellow grass just as well.
So let me get this straight—farmers have to comply and might lose 50 percent
Of their crop which would put the UK into famine mode—-
but golfers get unnaturally green grass in an abnormally dry august and probably September? They astroturfed the putting green—maybe astroturf a bit more!
Edit—golfers in FRANCE
I love golf. My area has affordable, high quality golf courses ran by the city and county and it's one of my favorite things to do in the summer.
That being said if my area was running out of water these need to be the first things to go like wtf? Golf is a luxury, not a necessity. There's no way golf courses should be drinking the last of our water. Also there are areas of the world where green golf courses shouldn't exist. If you want a golf course in the desert, use astroturf or don't have a fucking golf course.
I'm going to keep what these activists are doing in my back pocket in case I find myself in a similar situation. I love what they're doing. Those local officials have their heads up their donors asses.
This is what bothers me, and I know my response is a little privileged but….I like running up mountains….am I demanding Kansas building a fucking mountain so when I’m there I can run up it; of course not! Golf should be no different, it should be totally controlled by geographical constraints like a lot of outdoor sports.
Someone else commented that golf courses move the holes all the time and that this is barely an inconvenience for the golf course.
You’d have a better time throwing seeds on the course that are robust from weed killer and going to fuck up playing field.
Like mint or tumble weeds
~~Depends on how persistent the activists are. I'd imagine a luxury golf course with holes changing everyday, being covered in cement spots would lose them some money.~~
Edit: others have pointed out that this is only a mild inconvenience
But if activists started spraying vinegar, that would cause SERIOUS damage to the grass
My guess is after a couple incidences of defacing private property, they'd be arrested.
I would argue it mostly depends on how many people they have. One person probably couldn't fill 18 holes without getting caught, so you'd probably do at least like 5 people, and then the question is how many activists are willing to get arrested and then maybe be charged.
I was a golf greenskeeper once, this would be nothing more than an annoyance and wouldn’t cost much to fix. It takes 1 minute to make a new hole and the only bad part would be having to dig out the cement and fill it with dirt and seed it would would take 5 minutes tops.
Avid golfer.
Absolutely no reason why golf courses should be able to water in the middle of a drought. Same situation in California. Honestly I have zero problems with dirtball. Just keep the putting greens green. Or figure an alternative material that needs no water idk decomposed granite.. something.
I have no problems swinging @ a ball on dirt, sure my clubs may get fucked up quicker but that is fine by me. I would rather have the water available for people and food producing farms\ranches. Water for recreational use? Fuck that! If I am being asked to conserve water, that means we don't have enough for entertainment purposes.
Golf or taking a normal shower...
Golf or stretching the supply a couple more months..
I'll drop golf like a bad habit if needs be.
Great idea about cement in the holes!!
>Just keep the putting greens green. Or figure an alternative material
What do they use at putt putt golf that shit lasts forever or if you're fancy replace it every 25yrs?
Yeah, a person who plays golf can find 1000 alternatives to golf to do in their spare time. People who drink water and use it to wash can't really find water alternatives.
Eh idk about that. I love golf. I try to golf as much as possible. But you know what I love more? Earth. So yeah I choose golf courses that go first. Plenty of places that can have golf courses naturally looking decent without needing to ruin the world.
Ya I changed holes for a golf course, this is a bit of a piss off, but no big deal really.
Also we had an extra green called a nursery green to transplant sections for such cases
Now, *that* would be a pain in the ass. Mix a bunch of dry cement powder into the traps and then wait for rain. They'd have to filter out a bunch of gravel.
Some rich ass golfer is going to pay for a ton of security for their precious golf courses.
George Carlin would be proud of these guys.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4w7H48tBS8
Every single day, at 5am.. we stab a new hole in, usually on the opposite side of the green, (why you don’t usually see it) take that cylinder of grass and plug the old hole, make sure it’s flush and then after it’s mowed a few times it disappears back into the green.
"A golf course without a green is like an ice-rink without ice," Gérard Rougier of the French Golf Federation told the France Info news website
And animals/crops without water are like a golf course without a green. Your move Gerard
Imagine opening a golf course in the fucking desert.
EDIT: Article mentions it's located in France, which I glossed over completely. My point is still valid for the western USA.
Can’t speak for other parts of the state, but at least some courses around the Tucson area are irrigated using reclaimed water. That said, whenever I make a trip to the Phoenix area, I’m always amazed at how green some municipalities are over there with the landscaping. They must be using lots of water to maintain the look. Hopefully they use reclaimed for that, but i don’t know.
My farm has been in my family for 4 generations. When generation 1 moved in, back in the 1910's, they planted mint behind one of the buildings. I got mint for some iced tea I made today from that same mint patch. It spreads every year and requires absolutely constant maintenance or it would choke out just about every other plant.
This was my first thought. Then I remembered the (fake) Reddit story about someone planting mammoth and redwood trees in a town as a revenge for them cutting down a tree.
I'm eagerly awaiting the news story of, "Farmer hit with water restrictions takes his tractor to water-restriction-exempt golf course and cuts furrows with his plow, plants seeds on golf course."
In Arizona we have golf courses that use treated waste water from sewage treatment plants. While still not ideal use as the water is safe for human consumption they are however not allowed to use any groundwater for golf courses built after the 80's.
Cronyism is the reason why nothing meaningful ever gets done. Politicians are to worried about special interest groups rather than the people they represent
Look... If football stadiums can spray paint their fields to look green in the dead of winter or during a drought, golf courses can do the same. Fuck 'em.
Making golf an exception gotta be one of he most ridiculous things I have heard.
Those placing the restrictions don’t want to be personally effected. Can’t mess with their country clubs and golf courses. Let the peasants suffer
Like I said in another post this morning, politicians around the world need to learn that laws that they pass apply to them too.... We are all getting sick of that shit.
It’s far easier to continue passing laws which don’t affect them, rather than take the time to learn anything.
Like voting to raise their own salaries. As if they didn’t rake it in already.
Class war.
If water has to be rationed for drinking, showering, etc. then the grass at golf clubs should be allowed to go dry until the government comes up with an answer to alleviate ALL water rationing!!!
I feel like we're skipping part zero. Droughts happen, but for a city the size of Toulouse (1m+), I feel like rationing down to one toilet flush a day is a massive failure on the part of French infrastructure.
1 flush a day? So better hope you're a 1 shit family and everyone's cool with peeing outside.
Won’t work even if I lived alone. Lactose intolerance gives me an exception.
I literally poop 3x a day with normal bowel movements and healthy eating.... there is no way I could survive.
Same man. Everyone on Reddit always seems to talk about how they only shit once a day or less. I shit minimum 3 times a day. There's no way I'd survive a restriction like that.
It's ez, just don't flush all your shit till the end of the day and let it get nice and hot. Then when the pile of shit gets too high, flush! Eco Warrior!
Might need a poop knife.
We've had decades, half a century at least, of climate warnings. Rio - the first international agreement that "this climate thing is pretty fucking serious and we should all start doing something about it right now" - was over 30 years ago. The predictions are coming true. And even if by some miracle, the world was carbon neutral tomorrow, things are still going to keep getting worse because of the inertia in the system. None of this is shocking or unpredictable or coming out of left field. We haven't been blind sided by this. We've willingly, knowingly, consciously, and deliberately spent the last several decades actively making things worse while saying "Yeah, we really should do something about this. It's really serious."
My favorite recent bit was a climate activist calling out I believe it was sky news for decades of news coverage calling climate activist loony. It's baffling that people just aren't aware of how bad it is, and will be because if they knew they'd also be acting just as fucking "loony", it's bad really fucking bad.
Your missing the overarching point, droughts are happening over vast swathes of the world now. Parts in the EU are seeing the worst droughts in decades and obviously here in the US we are getting them too. But for some reason fancy places like these can ignore ordnance because “OuR ClIeNtS MiGhT GeT OfFeNdEd!” Imo golf courses are a massive waste of space, water resources and money. It’s better to cut down on 75-85% of all courses and turn them into something useful like affordable housing
Or public parks.
Without affordable housing... Those public parks will continue to become housing 😵💫
I’m a golfer and I agree. The game was invented in Scotland where they have no shortage of grass and misty humid air for it to grow. It was never intended to be in the desert (or Florida FFS what a terrible place to play) EDIT: I wasn't clear---obviously Florida doesn't have water issues, shouldn't have juxtaposed that statement with the desert part. But the kinds of hydroengineering and chemicals they need to make a specific kind of grass grow there causes all sorts of other environmental problems. It's also miserable to play because it's so damn hot and humid
You could adapt it for desert though, with packed sand for exemple.
Coober Pedy golf course in South Australia is in a desert. You carry a small piece of turf with you, and the greens are sand compacted with oil.
The Nullarbor links is the best way to play golf imho. Each hole is hours or even days apart and there are hazards (inc wildlife stealing your balls) to liven things up.
Back in the day there were a few courses near me that had sand greens.
I've always wanted to try a sand green. There are few out east of me, maybe this fall I'll go check them out.
Come on out to Kansas! I am a member at a sand green course. $5 green fee that goes in an unattended drop box. Drinking is encouraged. Biggest difference than a grass green course is chipping and putting (captain obvious here). Most sand green courses are considered “pasture golf”, so your slice won’t be a big deal.
That's why the state motto is, "Come to Kansas because a tornado flung you into an alternate dimension and you have to fight wizards to get back home, *stay* because of the sand golf."
I like George Carlin's take on golf: > Golfing is an 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 17,000 golf courses in America, they average over 150 acres a piece - that's 3 million plus acres, 4820 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 and 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 cocksuckers 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 pastime.
Didn't H.L. Mencken once say "Golf is a good walk ruined" back in the pre-golfcart era?
I think I watched a video on YouTube recently of this club! No Laying Up did a special on them!
As a non-golfer beyond the occasional mess about, that sounds really neat. How do they work, because based on my very limited knowledge of golf and sand usually it’s something you want to avoid?
Not sure of the composition but the sand greens were packed and the ball rolled well. This was back in the 60s.
I used to work at a course with a few sand greens left. It’s just regular old silica sand, they’re soaked with oil and packed. It the oil that makes it work. Edit: wow thanks for the gold! it’s my first time. Was it as good for you as it was for me?
I'm grateful that golf courses are ditching water hungry greens, in favor of more ecological approaches, such as oil soaked sand.
As a kid I played on a course that had them several times. Once on the green, you roll a path to the hole with the roller tool provided next to the green. You take your shot and then when your done you drag a rake behind you to smooth out your footprints. As a bad golfer, I find them more forgiving on the short game than grass greens.
It'll be compacted I'm guessing. Like a sand tennis court.
>In a petition, the activists said the exemption showed that "economic madness takes precedence over ecological reason".
This is just a small example of the excessive ways the rich is saying we support green initiatives but don’t want to actually want to sacrifice anything
"Welfare queens" when it's people, "necessary bailouts" when it's irresponsible banks that tanked the economy.
And also twist public regulations in their favour. It's a hand out when you're poor but just the rules when you're rich.
“Rules for thee but not for me” might as well be the universal politician slogan
If flushing your toilet is limited to once a day, lawns and courses have got to go. Not being able to flush leaves a health hazard in your bathroom. Edit: there are a lot of responses defending golf courses, even from a job loss position. There is very little stopping the golf courses from building storage tanks and supplying themselves. This would be the free market solution. Not the golf courses draining the public supply of water. Edit 2: I won’t be able to get everyone. Do some good for humanity all I ask. Edit 3: no need to report my comment to redditcares. It’s pretty low, since it is there to help people with mental health crises.
If I was living in an area where we could only flush once a day, but golf courses had the sprinklers going, I’d be leaving more than cement on those courses…
Just shit in front of the sprinkler and let it wash your ass. Turn off the water while you soap up to save it for the bottling company to sell it back to you please! There not enough to go around!
Shit in front of the sprinkler on the golf course. Then you don't even have to worry about cleaning your own lawn.
You were so close. Shit *on* the sprinkler before it activates. Then when the sprinkler head pops up it will spray through the mound of fences and spread your displeasure across the green. Bonus points if you leave a note in a plastic bag next to your donation stating that it's human waste and a public health hazard until the green is cleaned.
I'm not sure the sprinkler heads can handle that kind of weight.
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Support the bowel movement
Check their username, I don't think it would be able to support one of theirs.
Ah yes, the best bidet, Mississippi river water in California at 8009 psi
The extra 9 psi is what really gets a deep clean.
All the best bidets are also enemas.
> If I was living in an area where we could only flush once a day Please tell me that's one flush per person. How are you supposed to flush three dumps and 3x toilet paper once as a family. Also rip IBS sufferers. This is my worst nightmare lol.
Depending on how big your dishes are you can use that grey water for at least a flush. Good luck with the others!
I knew someone who shit in the holes. Not because of water, but because they threw him out when he sneaked onto the course for free.
You'd be surprised how common this is. I worked on a golf course maintenance crew for two years. We had to clean shit from the cup almost once a month.
I think it was a fairly regular thing for him also. Dont think he ever actually paid to get on anywhere. Surprised there are others though!
An alfalfa farm in Utah recently interviewed uses 900 gallons a MINUTE. I don’t flush my toilet that much in a year…
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Dustbowl 2.0 coming. Smart enough to know we should stop it. Too fucking dumb to do anything to actually stop it.
We can just use Brawndo. It has what plants crave.
Ugh, dustbowl might be optimistic, firebowl might be the sequel we get. Where I am it’s the worst drought in 500 years me the rivers are running dry, not cool.
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Big facts more people need to learn and understand this. I’ll confess I didn’t know any of that until recently when John Oliver did deep dive segment on water out in those states. Certainly was eye opening as most of his pieces are.
The John Oliver piece https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtxew5XUVbQ
Thank you very much for getting the link out. I shoulda provided it to begin with. Appreciate your help getting it out there!
A lot of these things are caused by political decision. There's similar issues with land use subsidies in Europe. Farmers get paid a flat rate to work the land. Conventional wisdom as far back as the 11th century and before is to switch around crops to let the soil regenerate. A big part is to not even work parts of the land at all. Every farmer knows this. You also don't get any money for letting parts of your land be forested (which helps with wind carrying away soil and water retention and all sorts of stuff). It can even increase overall yield. But the subsidies keep many farms afloat, so constant use it is. I'm no expert and had this explained by some farmers, recently, so take it with a grain of salt. Important to note, though, that this isn't in any way and endorsement for neoliberalism or anything like that. We just need some political pressure to make sure these old laws and regulations get replaced by better ones. Ones that take into account the ecological cost of things.
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ALL water rights need to be reset. This century-old rights to water is nuts!
Any irrigated farm will pump out those sorts of numbers. They typically irrigate 24/7 with each individual sprinkler head doing 5 gallons per minute. It's crazy that water conservation laws EVER affect a family before a farmer.
It’s that bullshit “Right to Farm Act”. Essentially, farmers can’t be regulated for *anything*. Water pollution, air pollution, water consumption — they just declare that the government is violating their right to grow food. Here in California’s Central Valley, the unique atmospheric conditions hold particulates in the air forever, but the air pollution districts can’t stop polluting practices like almond tree shaking or tilling dry soil. Never mind we have the highest asthma rates in the country or that the valley dominates the top 10 list of America’s worst polluted cities. The highways are littered with bullshit signs that say “Is growing food wasting water?” Yeah, actually, growing alfalfa and almonds in the desert with ancient, leaky irrigation systems **is** wasting water. Thanks for asking.
> Is growing food wasting water?” Yeah, actually, growing alfalfa and almonds in the desert with ancient, leaky irrigation systems is wasting water. Thanks for asking. Yep. If the government just paid every farmer the full value of the alfalfa crop in exchange for just not growing alfalfa, a ridiculous subsidy, it would save billions of dollars and [basically end the droughts in cali](https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-doing/)
I remember when I worked in the valley and saw the huge plumes of dust from the tree shaking. It was surreal.
I work for a public water agency that was within 200 days of running out of water last year. We still allowed the 3 golf courses in our area to water greens. Each golf course was using 100-200k per day. They should have been banned I couldn’t believe it. An often unconsidered consequence is the water agency runs out of money. Water agencies are funded by rates not taxes. They also operate on fixed costs and when water use drops 20,30,40,50 percent so do revenues.
This wouldn’t be a problem if the water agency was owned by the people. Public utilities should be owned by the government profit isn’t the goal when their are no private shareholders to be beholden to.
My agency is publicly owned with elected Baird making decisions.
I first got involved in politics volunteering with the Obama campaign in 2012. I think when I changed broadly from a liberal to a leftist perspective was when I started to realize the answer to questions like, "why don't we just give enough water to the people who need it," was always something to do with the market. Usually something complicated, but something that made sense at the end of the day. The difference between the path I took and me becoming a neoliberal was choosing to give up on the market rather than giving up on getting people what they need. Edit: ok, I think I see what some folks are talking about with the wording. To clarify, I'm talking about the difference between the path I took and an alternate version of reality where I might've become a neoliberal. I am not a neoliberal.
Wow this is a great explanation of how one can shift perspectives from newfound insights. I wasn’t volunteering but learning more about politics as I’ve gotten older has helped me learn that without being a progressive leftist I would be sacrificing most all of my values. Sadly too many don’t care to learn more or simply don’t want to change their stance on anything.
.... Is that actually a thing? *The limit, not the health hazard*
In areas where eater usage restrictions have been passed, yes. You can be limited to so little water that you can only afford one or two flushes per day. These water restrictions dont ever seem to be based on any valid metrics, just a percentile reduction on overall water usage for an area and the biggest water wasters somehow manage to get an exemption. Golf courses should be required to switch over to turf to reduce water consumption. Its not like they dont have the money for it.
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>Audubon International estimates that the average American course uses 312,000 gallons per day. In a place like Palm Springs, where 57 golf courses challenge the desert, each course eats up a million gallons a day. That is, each course each day in Palm Springs consumes as much water as an American family of four uses in four years. https://www.npr.org/2008/06/11/91363837/water-thirsty-golf-courses-need-to-go-green There's approx. 16,000 golf courses in America, the highest in the world. It's just like asking consumers to produce less CO2 when corporations make up 70% of all emissions.
Easy answer, just give the courses two or three flushes of water a day. They'll either figure out a solution real quick or be out of business. Either way, reason wins.
"If everyone showered 10 minutes less a day, we would have enough water to not have to ask large scale farming operations to not flood their fields!"
I I showered for ten minutes less per day, I’d effectively have finished before I even start.
Yeah, I'd be negative at that point. How does peeing in the shower affect the time?
> even from a job loss position There's zero argument from a job loss position: almost every other use of golf-course land would create more jobs than lost.
Yeah I don’t get how people would lose jobs over this. They gonna fire people because the grass isn’t as green?
Use fake grass. Another free market solution. The wealthy are going to burn this planet if we let them keep this up.
>flushing your toilet is limited to once a day Not in the deepest depths of Australian water restrictions in a drought that lasted over a decade did I ever witness that kind of bullshit.
I am involved heavily with national golf administration and I whole heartily agree. Water supply has been identified as an issue for golf clubs here for at least a decade and it is expected that clubs collect and store their own water for this purpose. Relying on town supplies alone is just not acceptable. Edit: spelling
This is not an option with IBS
On a good day, one flush might be enough. On a bad day, 18 holes wouldn't suffice. Source: have Crohn's
I have celiac and have chosen to not visit or live certain places over the reliability of the plumbing. This is not negotiable.
> jobs lost There's no shortage of work. We're an adaptable species. They'll find something else to do.
Yeah. Coal miners are a dying breed too and they should be.
If we all have to make personal sacrifices to save the planet then IMO it is only fair to start with the luxuries that 99.9% of the world don’t benefit from. We unwashed masses have had to endure far worse than a moratorium on rolling your fat arse around on a golf cart, across a well curated wasteland. If we can do it without unimaginable amounts of wealth then they won’t have a problem at all.
IIRC protestors against trump's course in Scotland used to shit in the holes, so that's always an option.
I work at a pool and the neighborhood has a golf course next to it. A couple of weeks ago it was raining pretty hard and while it was raining the sprinklers were on and shooting water like a firehose. Golf courses are very wasteful
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Is anyone asking whether green grass is needed to play golf? Because why not just play on dead grass?
It's not. I live in a place where the golf course doesn't have much grass. Golfers carry around a piece of astroturf to play their ball from.
because dead grass is for poor people
This is like when Con Ed tries to tell New Yorkers to "conserve electricity" in a heat wave, when all the screens in Times Square are going full blast (for reference: Times Square uses 161 megawatts of electricity every year. That's enough energy to power approximately 161,000 average U.S. homes and twice the electricity required to power all of the casinos in Las Vegas.) Fuck that, I'm blasting my AC lol
"While residents cannot water their gardens or wash their cars in the worst-hit municipalities, golf courses have escaped the nationwide restrictions." "Golf officials say greens would die in three days without water." And the gardens won't?
People. Let me highjack this comment to remind everyone. Fuck the hosepipe ban, water your local trees. They’re on their knees and need the help.
Get a water butt if you can. I'm still working through the 440 litres I collect from this year's rain. I've got 2, they cost me £30 each from a local DIY place and took 5 minutes to connect to my downpipes. I'll also put slimline ones on the front so they're not an eyesore soon. To clarify some points: I'm in the UK, we don't have any rainwater collection laws here. Additionally they only fill until they are full, the overflow will continue on its way otherwise. Some Local councils will supply water butts if you check. Yes water butt is a genuine term. This water is only to be used ok the garden. You should look into grey water reclamation if you're after in house uses.
> Get a water butt if you can. I'm still working through the 440 litres I collect from this year's rain. I've got 2, they cost me £30 each from a local DIY place and took 5 minutes to connect to my downpipes. for other US people this is 116 gallons or ~2 55 gallon drums. If you are in the US there are actually a lot of places that sell 55 gallon drums for dirt cheap (like $9-$15) that you can purchase and just use for water. Make sure they didn't have anything but biodegradable stuff in them (one place I get them from they had vanilla in them, another is just food stuff but all are clean). also make sure there are no laws about collecting rain water, yes places that experience constant draughts have laws like that.
You can also set up a washing machine diverter to water your outside tidbits with your machine’s gray water, so long as you use biodegradable detergents. I know there are some DIY kits and professionals that can set it up too; the link is just a general overview. https://modernfarmer.com/2017/03/laundry-garden-irrigate-graywater/
I'll second this. I lived in Texas during a multi-year drought. Whenever a storm passed through, all the dead trees would get knocked over causing loads of property damage, toppled power/phone lines, and tons of erosion.
Australian here, grew up with water restrictions my whole life. Get a big bucket, big enough to stand in. Put it in your shower and use the water you catch to water your garden.
Know what else will die in three days? People. But of course, rich people having nice green grass to look at definitely takes priority…
>nice green grass to look at Oh and it can't be fake grass for reasons you poors wouldn't understand.
It shouldn't be fake grass either. That shit is made of plastic and will just end up spreading its microplastic disease into every waterway and animal that is nearby.
what if you make the fake grass from fur and just paint it green? No need to thank me, my ideas are free of charge
What's the paint made from
Spinach
lead and dihydrogen monoxide
Fake grass is terrible for the environment as well. It's pure plastic. Grow something native to your area that doesn't need a lot of extra water and care. Clover for example is a great way to have a deep green lawn and doesn't require much water or care at all. I've heard some people say they only need to mow their clover lawn once a year.
Clover used to be common in lawns, before a fertilizer was developed that killed clover and the company launched a massive marketing campaign likening clover in lawns to being poor and saying that every self-respecting American should have a "grass only" lawn
We’ve got a clover and fescue mix at the moment and my lawn is still bright green despite nearly a fortnight of no rain. The clover suppresses the other weeds too. It’s brilliant. You can buy microclover/fescue seed mixes on eBay or from seed shops. Highly recommend.
> the clover suppresses the other weeds too Well that's just bad for business, how do you expect the poor poor corps to sell poison to people if they don't believe they need it?
>"Golf officials say greens would die in three days without water." AND?? Let it die.
As a lifelong golfer, I say absolutely let the greens die. Golf courses in water-stress areas have no reason for being.
“But think of the wealthy socialites that will be denied the pleasant views while golfing after bottomless mimosa brunch at the country club! Think of their needs! “ /s
more then that, so what if the grass dies? (btw it wouldn't die bust just go dormant) I don't think there is any technical requirement for golf fields to have green grass at all. You can play golf on yellow grass just as well.
So let me get this straight—farmers have to comply and might lose 50 percent Of their crop which would put the UK into famine mode—- but golfers get unnaturally green grass in an abnormally dry august and probably September? They astroturfed the putting green—maybe astroturf a bit more! Edit—golfers in FRANCE
Wow there aren't even exceptions for farmers? That's absolute madness that golfers can continue.
Turns out france and the UK are different countries.
Not if William the Conqueror has anything to say about it
I love golf. My area has affordable, high quality golf courses ran by the city and county and it's one of my favorite things to do in the summer. That being said if my area was running out of water these need to be the first things to go like wtf? Golf is a luxury, not a necessity. There's no way golf courses should be drinking the last of our water. Also there are areas of the world where green golf courses shouldn't exist. If you want a golf course in the desert, use astroturf or don't have a fucking golf course. I'm going to keep what these activists are doing in my back pocket in case I find myself in a similar situation. I love what they're doing. Those local officials have their heads up their donors asses.
This is what bothers me, and I know my response is a little privileged but….I like running up mountains….am I demanding Kansas building a fucking mountain so when I’m there I can run up it; of course not! Golf should be no different, it should be totally controlled by geographical constraints like a lot of outdoor sports.
Someone else commented that golf courses move the holes all the time and that this is barely an inconvenience for the golf course. You’d have a better time throwing seeds on the course that are robust from weed killer and going to fuck up playing field. Like mint or tumble weeds
~~Depends on how persistent the activists are. I'd imagine a luxury golf course with holes changing everyday, being covered in cement spots would lose them some money.~~ Edit: others have pointed out that this is only a mild inconvenience But if activists started spraying vinegar, that would cause SERIOUS damage to the grass
My guess is after a couple incidences of defacing private property, they'd be arrested. I would argue it mostly depends on how many people they have. One person probably couldn't fill 18 holes without getting caught, so you'd probably do at least like 5 people, and then the question is how many activists are willing to get arrested and then maybe be charged.
I was a golf greenskeeper once, this would be nothing more than an annoyance and wouldn’t cost much to fix. It takes 1 minute to make a new hole and the only bad part would be having to dig out the cement and fill it with dirt and seed it would would take 5 minutes tops.
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Just don't ask a golfer. You won't like the answer.
Avid golfer. Absolutely no reason why golf courses should be able to water in the middle of a drought. Same situation in California. Honestly I have zero problems with dirtball. Just keep the putting greens green. Or figure an alternative material that needs no water idk decomposed granite.. something. I have no problems swinging @ a ball on dirt, sure my clubs may get fucked up quicker but that is fine by me. I would rather have the water available for people and food producing farms\ranches. Water for recreational use? Fuck that! If I am being asked to conserve water, that means we don't have enough for entertainment purposes. Golf or taking a normal shower... Golf or stretching the supply a couple more months.. I'll drop golf like a bad habit if needs be. Great idea about cement in the holes!!
>Just keep the putting greens green. Or figure an alternative material What do they use at putt putt golf that shit lasts forever or if you're fancy replace it every 25yrs?
Astroturf.
Yeah, a person who plays golf can find 1000 alternatives to golf to do in their spare time. People who drink water and use it to wash can't really find water alternatives.
Eh idk about that. I love golf. I try to golf as much as possible. But you know what I love more? Earth. So yeah I choose golf courses that go first. Plenty of places that can have golf courses naturally looking decent without needing to ruin the world.
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Crazy idea indeed. Next you'll be saying "ski & snowboard resorts should only be built where it snows"
They dig a new hole in a different location each day. Other than regrowing the grass where they dig out the concrete it's not a big deal.
Ya I changed holes for a golf course, this is a bit of a piss off, but no big deal really. Also we had an extra green called a nursery green to transplant sections for such cases
I imagine putting Portland cement in the sand traps would fuck your day tho...
Now, *that* would be a pain in the ass. Mix a bunch of dry cement powder into the traps and then wait for rain. They'd have to filter out a bunch of gravel.
The problem here is waiting for rain. There is none
But they haven’t stopped using their sprinklers…
Cement the water lines
Some rich ass golfer is going to pay for a ton of security for their precious golf courses. George Carlin would be proud of these guys. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4w7H48tBS8
Wait really? I had no idea. It’s crazy they can do that without leaving obvious marks all over
There are so many cool videos of this. They make a new hole and the grass from the new hole fills the old hole.
Every single day, at 5am.. we stab a new hole in, usually on the opposite side of the green, (why you don’t usually see it) take that cylinder of grass and plug the old hole, make sure it’s flush and then after it’s mowed a few times it disappears back into the green.
You can usually spot it up close.
They'll just take it from the putting green
"A golf course without a green is like an ice-rink without ice," Gérard Rougier of the French Golf Federation told the France Info news website And animals/crops without water are like a golf course without a green. Your move Gerard
Isn't an ice rink without ice just a skating rink? Someone should tell this guy that roller skates exist.
Most rinks near me take out their ice in the summer and use them for lacrosse and other sports.
Imagine opening a golf course in the fucking desert. EDIT: Article mentions it's located in France, which I glossed over completely. My point is still valid for the western USA.
Or building a city in one https://youtu.be/4PYt0SDnrBE
Can confirm, in AZ. We really shouldn't have any.
Can’t speak for other parts of the state, but at least some courses around the Tucson area are irrigated using reclaimed water. That said, whenever I make a trip to the Phoenix area, I’m always amazed at how green some municipalities are over there with the landscaping. They must be using lots of water to maintain the look. Hopefully they use reclaimed for that, but i don’t know.
All the courses in Phoenix use grey water that can't legally be used as tap water
The article says Tolouse France. Which is not a desert.
Southern France is a desert?
Give it time.
Should have planted mammoth tree seeds everywhere.
No no just sprinkle some mint seeds around.. Anyone who has ever had mint in their garden knows they'll never get rid of that shit
My farm has been in my family for 4 generations. When generation 1 moved in, back in the 1910's, they planted mint behind one of the buildings. I got mint for some iced tea I made today from that same mint patch. It spreads every year and requires absolutely constant maintenance or it would choke out just about every other plant.
bamboo would also be a bitch. That might be the most evil of trees.
Isn't it a grass?
Yes
Rosemary, too
Fast growing weeds would be more disrupting.
Golf courses are generally very good at dealing with weeds. They probably wouldn’t even notice
I’m pretty sure those greens are sprayed with pesticides a lot
This was my first thought. Then I remembered the (fake) Reddit story about someone planting mammoth and redwood trees in a town as a revenge for them cutting down a tree.
I’d highly suggest devils hair weed. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuscuta
Or just hit it up with a dirt bike if you feeling frisky
I'm eagerly awaiting the news story of, "Farmer hit with water restrictions takes his tractor to water-restriction-exempt golf course and cuts furrows with his plow, plants seeds on golf course."
I'm an avid golfer. I don't think golf courses should be exempt from the ban. Golf courses require a TON of water that would be best used elsewhere.
Time to build mini-golf courses in your backyards.
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In Arizona we have golf courses that use treated waste water from sewage treatment plants. While still not ideal use as the water is safe for human consumption they are however not allowed to use any groundwater for golf courses built after the 80's.
"I drink... YOUR milkshake!"
Cronyism is the reason why nothing meaningful ever gets done. Politicians are to worried about special interest groups rather than the people they represent
politicians golf too
Good for them. Yes, it's an easy fix, but they're drawing attention to the situation.
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Look... If football stadiums can spray paint their fields to look green in the dead of winter or during a drought, golf courses can do the same. Fuck 'em.