Compared to what it costs for a day out to watch a premiership football game, a days golf works out fairly cheap.

Most popular sports cost the individual playing it around £1000 for equipment plus the membership of any club they belong to. Any more than that and it becomes too expensive to become popular.

Golf in Scotland is considered to be an artesans game, golf in England is considered to be a "professional" mans game (Doctor's, solicitors, etc), no idea how that came about, probably dates back to the fact that James Ist and VIth played it so the English regarded it as a "royal" game.

"Golf is not a sport, it is an elitist pastime for snobs who have no dress sense."

Too many people play it world-wide for it not to be considered a sport. The latter part of that quoted sentence Strollin', identifies you as being a perfectly balanced individual - a chip on each shoulder.