The amount of water used is somewhat less important than what the source of the water is.
And it's important to understand that "using water" isn't like "using coal". In other words, while coal can be burned once, water is in a cycle that means water can be "used" infinitly.
But back to the source. A golf course near me takes effluent water (ie treated sewerage) destined for pumping out to sea. They spread it over a large piece of land. What is not consumed by plants, or evaporation, ends up in an underground aquifer.
So it "uses" a lot of water. But it's not using tap water.
Obviously this is not true for all courses. Hence the issue of "source", not "quantity" is material.
"The amount of water used is somewhat less important than what the source of the water is."
Where I live, the golf courses are the largest and often only consumers of recycled water — in a water stressed city. This directly subsidises indigent water use.
It doesn't stop the easily-offended from agitating to convert them into low-cost housing.
“easily-offended / agitating”? Hmm. There’s lots of good reasons to convert golf courses to low-cost housing, or use the recycled water for something else. Expand irrigation of parks, recharge groundwater, create wetlands, create dual plumbing networks to use the recycled water for toilet flushing etc.
There will of course always be different potential uses for land. And there are up and down sides to every argument.
It's easy though to dismiss options which don't benefit me personally. If I don't cycle then money spent on cycle tracks is wasted. If I don't golf then I'll lean towards non-golf options.
Incidentally it's very seldom local users who are lobbying for more local low-cost housing. That typically reduces neighborhood property values.
Equally having green spaces is something that drives up property values etc.
And yes, creative use of effluent would be nice. We should be able to recycle grey water into toilets etc. But that is an infrastructure change, so not easy to implement.
Yes we need public green spaces. And yes we need sports fields and golf courses and so on. It's not necessarily an either/or situation.