I'm not saying there's no phoenetic element to it, but a number of kanji characters literally mean words and don't have phoenemes

Kanji characters mean a lot of things

Most of them mean words or parts of bigger words or both

There are more types of logograms in chinese, there are simple meaning-focused, then you have composite meanings, then you have composites of sound and meaning .... it's a real bitch.

not just talking about onomatopoeia, either

Kanji is basically meant to make sentences easier

It really doesn't tbh

Exactly

Let me rephrase that

*shorter*

It's a shit writing system and it's why hiragana was invented

But kanji are still used heavily

I actually thing Japanese itself evolved around the kanjis and they around it, that's why it is so strange of a combination fro the Western mind.

its condensive, and geometrically more efficient, but god damn, not a great trade off

@Lucienne d'Anwyl No.

It's not "shit".

It is shot yes

It fits well to chinese, but not so to japanese.

Memorizing a meric fuckton of symbols to be able to read a language is by definition shit

Which is why the japs loaned the concept, then slowly adapted it to better fit their language.

Non phonetic writing systems are shit

True

The modern Japanese would loose its cohesion without the kanjis.

Much like slavs invented hačeks for čšž

There's a reason why no one in the west uses pictograms anymore

Because they're ahit

Shit

@Lucienne d'Anwyl No, it's because that's how writing evolved.

It's because the system was known to be terrible

>don't use pictograms

*cough cough* emojis

You literally do use pictograms anyway.

Not only emojis.

TRAFFIC SIGNS

Warning symbols too

And that

Signs are a visual cue where writing would be unclear

That being said writing does exist without pictograms

Because including fucktons of symbols in long blocks of letters is retarded

Slavs just use Bulgarian alphabets cause we Bulgars are the superiors around here @Goddess Tyche

It's as simple as that!