> You could just as well consider words like "debt", "lead" or "Wycombe" to be kanjis, and nobody complains about their disconnect from pronunciation. Back in

> You could just as well consider words like "debt", "lead" or "Wycombe" to be kanjis, and nobody complains about their disconnect from pronunciation. Back in the day, I spent a couple of years teaching in a high school, which exposed me to a fairly large group of Australians of Japanese descent who were learning Japanese as a second language. They did complain about it, and quite fiercely, especially the ones learning it due of family pressure, and not innate interest. If most people don't complain, I guess it's because a.) they have no exposure to kanji in the first place, b.) they grew up with it, or c.) because their environment regards it as culturally insensitive to complain about foreign writing systems. If none of these apply, you do seem to get plenty of complaints. None of these factors hold for English, so it makes sense that people complain about the spelling.