The seven young Arab Americans largely achieved ordinary life goals and chose service careers

Evidence

Ten years ago, I wrote that these seven young people mostly wanted what the majority of young people want: opportunity, marriage, happiness, and the chance to fulfill their potential. A decade later, they have, for the most part, been able to achieve those goals. Their accomplishments are testaments not only to their individual talents and abilities but also to America’s capacity to provide prospects for its younger generations, something we must preserve at all costs if we are to succeed as a society. What’s interesting is that most of the people I wrote about have since chosen professions in law, education, or community building—in other words, careers dedicated to social justice and serving others. This spirit tracks with the increasingly progressive bent of the larger Muslim American community today, a quality clearly captured by the Pew Research Center’s survey of Muslim Americans in 2017. That sense of service has also brought with it a strong sense of identity mixed with responsibility. — Moustafa Bayoumi, How Does It Feel to Be a Problem? Being…, 1011