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Comment by anonu | Hacker News Reader

This is a very heart-warming story from this little country that I am from. Lebanese have long shown their ability to innovate and excel in the face of adversity. Sadly, today, we are at the mercy of politicians and religious extremists who just don't get it. Lebanon will always overcome.

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It is a goddamn shame what happened to that country over the years and I really do hope it will bounce back. My pet theory is that it is inevitable because of the internet.

Do Lebanese nerds have an English hangout somewhere to conspire with nerds from elsewhere?

There's an English tech-forum here: http://lebgeeks.com

Leb geeks is a nice forum however it's very local.

What happened in Lebanon is part of a demographic pattern that has played out repeatedly in the middle east. By many accounts Syria was a lovely and peaceful place not so long ago. Before Cairo was the pit of poverty it is now it was by many accounts a very pleasant place.

That's pretty much what you get when colonist powers(France and Britain at the time) divide up the area between themselves without any regard for local sectarian differences[1]. The same pattern also played out in Africa.

In Lebanon as in Syria(I'm Lebanese but have lived in Syria for an extended period of time in the past) the population is extremely heterogenous with racist feelings and ideology being a very common thing. To arbitrarily divide up the area while disregarding this is either an extremely foolish thing to do, or likelier a ploy by the then colonialist powers to retain long-term control of the area by keeping its population ever-divided.

It doesn't exactly help, that into this already explosive mix was implanted the nation-state of Israel which as been in a state of perpetual war with its neighbours ever since.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes–Picot_Agreement

The borders and all that stuff is relevant, but the essential problem has been dysgenics, as I have heard it. Highly fertile, poor hicks came to demographically overwhelm the middle class in these places over multi-decade periods.

I think he is referring to Hezbollah. Secretarian violence along racial lines is an issue but not a given, what really makes things explosive is religion.

I'm Israeli btw and terrified of high birth rates amongst the ultra religious here. It seems we might escape this problem as things stand but it sure does garner a lot of empathy with me.

I hope you are right but I have my doubts. I am a Lebanese who’s trying to Love Lebanon. The Lebanese ability to innovate is motivated by personal gains regardless of (and sometimes at the expense of) the benefit to the country as a whole. And that’s because there has rarely been a sense of unity in this country since its inception by the west (even during the so called “Paris of the middle east” era). The first mention of the term Lebanese in books was in the 40’s according to Ngram viewer. http://goo.gl/6T8jhp. Before that the area was comprised of diverse clans and tribes loosely held together by the Ottoman Empire. I doubt that Lebanese from diverse backgrounds would have been able to do anything useful before fighting each other on who’s the boss!! BTW the university and guys mentioned in the article are of Armenian origins.

I've worked with many Lebanese, and found them to be very intelligent and resourceful. The country had a huge brain drain to France and elsewhere during their civil war.

Not just during the war. It's been on-going ever since. I usually tell foreigners that our prime export is young engineers.

It is very rare for young and talented programmers to stay here. If they have the means to leave for the states or Europe and study and then work there, very few give it a second thought.

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