Do you prefer simplfied or traditional Chinese characters?

I personally think tradition characters are more beautiful and sophisticated.

Chinese characters are not meant to be simple; even simplified characters are not that simple or easy for the ones who are not familiar with Chinese characters. If Chinese people had truly wanted simple characters, they should've invented phonetic alphabets like Roman alphabet, Hangul or Hiragana.

I think they were just trying to communicate initially and it worked! Personally I like the traditional characters. They look like art to me.

I don't have a particular preference. With strong familiarity with both forms, I don't recognise which is which occasionally. When writing, simplified characters are definitely preferable, as I can only do them and writing them is much easier and less time-consuming.

i am not Chinese, my native language is Estonian,

I like simplified Chinese for some reasons

1: they are regarded as modern Chinese characters, and traditional chinese characters are regarded as middle chinese characters which seem to be used in majority in middle time.(My standard of modern chinese is which one is used in majority).
In this aspect, I rarely see that Brits need to learn both Modern and Old English at the same time during their school time.
Are those who insist using "traditional chinese characters" the one who is "out of time" and is living in ancient time or do they like to "preserve" ancient stuffs? "ironically"

2: the history of the Chinese characters are the history of being simplified

From " Oracle bone script" to "traditional Chinese characters", traditional chinese characters were also regarded as "ancient simplified chinese characters" ,the users of "Oracle bone script" at that time insist using "Oracle bone script"? No!
So, why not "traditional Chinese characters" give up using traditional chinese characters and go back to use "Oracle bone script" by the reason for preserving their "culture"?

so, for me, preserving traditional chinese characters is ridiculous!

3: who cares which is beautiful and which is full of "art"?
What we only care is which is easier to write, so we choose simplified chinese characters.

" who cares which is beautiful and which is full of "art"?
What we only care is which is easier to write, so we choose simplified chinese characters."

I can see that simplified characters save time, so I don't have a problem with your position. Saying "who cares" though, hmmm, maybe you don't appreciate art and Chinese culture...

Chinese characters can hardly be changed into phonetic alphabets such as "Latin/Greek alphabet", Hiragana/katakana, or something just like Hangul.

Perhaps Homophony is only one of the reasons which appear, to a certain degree, to have some problems on reforming Chinese writing system. And the fact, that Japanese people still cannot take KANJI away from its writing system, fully proves the importance of Chinese characters (KANJI/HANJA).

East Asian people (China/Japan/Korea) generally tend to prefer Traditional characters, whereas the Western people would prefer Simplified style for it may be easier to write, but I think, Traditional style seems more reasonable and beautiful in terms of word-formation rules. Traditional style is not so difficult to remember and write, probably easier to remember, because a new Traditional characters consist of a few parts of single KANJIs which we'd already known before, but Simplified style tends to ask people to remember it renewedly. If you're not native Chinese, it's not easy to understand it.

<<I can see that simplified characters save time, so I don't have a problem with your position. Saying "who cares" though, hmmm, maybe you don't appreciate art and Chinese culture...>>

It's not compulsory to appreciate art. Besides, the simplified ones are more beautiful. They resemble clean, modern, more abstract art.

IS
<......writing them is much easier and less time-consuming.>



If you just type Traditional characters with keyboard, instead of writing them on the paper with pen, the time you spend would be the same.

I prefer simplified Chinese because it will save my "ink" when printing a paper....

>>Are those who insist using "traditional chinese characters" the one who is "out of time" and is living in ancient time or do they like to "preserve" ancient stuffs? "ironically"

Come to the southern flanks of my country, and you will see "traditional chinese characters" are used by modern people like me. I'm not a guy from the Qing Dynasty, and yet this set of characters are my native script.

>>so, for me, preserving traditional chinese characters is ridiculous!

if your reasons are about 1) popularity and 2) your prediction of the development of history, then preserving your own native language is also ridiculous. Generic Chinese is written and spoken in different ways by almost 1/5 of human beings on earth... while your language only by a million.

That you think simplified characters are "easier" to write and are more popular (over 1.3 billion versus +20 mil. in Taiwan and almost 6 mil. in Hong Kong and Macau)... so that the 26 mil. should have their native script abolished is as ridiculous as abolishing estonian...

==

Actually, as I learned at university, simplified characters are just a total of some 2000 characters, and the huge majority are those that only radicals or some small stroke combinations have been simplified systematically, thanks to the suggestion of Mao who wasn't actually a linguist/expert in the language.

What is the minority? There are some 300 characters, many of which suggested (in similar shapes) by Qian Xuantong in the 1930s, that have been significantly simplified and changed... and many are beyond recognition to the eyes of native writers of the traditional characters. 尘 barely resembles 塵, even tho the former is more like a pictorial symbol for dust (small mud) than the latter. 义 is very different from 義, without any obvious parts that suggest "meaning"/righteousness. The latter is goat + pronoun "me", not obvious, either, but the former is so ugly... with only a dot and a cross. Does that mean anything with triad societies in pre-communist China and Hong Kong or... I don't know. (義 is an important principle in Chinese triad societies, even tho they are in fact criminal organizations...)

I don't think I have to explain in depth which is better. If I could vote in a nationwide election across the straits, I'd definitely vote NO to abolishing traditional characters and YES to restoring them in the PRC.

Note:

JIAJIA, 我想你也的確是中國人來的。這裡總有些傢伙很喜歡找碴兒的，不用理他們。

-And the fact, that Japanese people still cannot take KANJI away from its writing system, fully proves the importance of Chinese characters.-

But it can be done. Chinese characters disappeared from Korean in the last 100 years, its learning is optional, only for philologist.

Xie

謝先生，很開心在這裡遇到中國同胞，謝謝你的提醒。這裡的反華情緒很高漲。

歐美人也反華，韓國人和日本人也在反華，真不知道我們華人究竟哪裡做錯了。

<But it can be done. Chinese characters disappeared from Korean in the last 100 years.>

Japanese have ever attempted to abolish KANJIs of its writing system, but finally this idea was not considered as a better project, and without KANJIs, Japanese would be very difficult to read distinctly and understand quickly.

BTW, I can still saw the HANJAs(=KANJIs) on Korean newspapers, magazines, important files, dictionaries, & so on, because of the homonymic words and confusion jamming.