From Bauhaus to Golf Course
1st January 2010
Steve Sailer explains golf.
The current theory for why golf courses are so attractive to millions (mostly men), perhaps first put forward in John Strawn’s book Driving the Green: The Making of a Golf Course, is that they look like happy hunting grounds—a Disney-version of the primordial East African grasslands. Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson, author of the landmark 1975 book Sociobiology, once told me, “I believe that the reason that people find well-landscaped golf courses ‘beautiful’ is that they look like savannas, down to the scattered trees, copses, and lakes, and most especially if they have vistas of the sea.”
Any reflection on why Obama spends so much time on the links (IYKWIMAITYD, as Joe Bob would say) would be castigated as racist, so I’ll refrain; I’d hate to get the reputation as a harborer of thoughts controversial.
Generally, men (the hunters) tend to prefer sweeping vistas, while women (the gatherers) prefer enclosed verdant refuges. Perhaps it’s no accident that a longtime favorite book among little girls is called “The Secret Garden.” Similarly, women make up a sizable majority of gardeners while men often obsess over lawn care.
Overgeneralizations that promote sexual stereotypes, on the other hand, are just fun.