Everyone does, not just Americans. People aren't born knowing what they want out of life. So the first instinct or the default setting, is to do what everyone else is doing. If everyone around you is chasing X you are likely to chase it too. The more connected the world gets the more that tendency is amplified. Everyone wants an iPhone and everyone wants to line up for Avengers 29 or whatever. If it was just the Americans Apple and Disney wouldn't be raking in the cash that they do. They are just taking advantage of that default setting.
People who have twiddled about with their own default settings, whether they are in China, America or Congo find different routes to happiness that have nothing to do with what the rest of herd is upto.
Michigan isn't a terribly dense state but has a large Muslim population.
My rural hometown had a population of around 2000 people, and supposedly around 10% or so are hmong. They weren't treated any differently as far as I knew; several were part of what passed for the preppy / popular clique in school.
I am a white male, and get plenty of stares, because I am unusually tall and have an unusual hair style. Wherever you go, if you stand out, people will notice. That isn't a bad thing, and it doesn't mean people don't like you.
Looks like the oldest mosques in the united states are in places like Maine, North Dakota, and Iowa (in addition to obvious places like NYC). Like I said before, this is a big, diverse country.
Wear a mossy oak hijab into the rotation if you want to go out of your way to fit in (or just don't any you'll probably be fine).
IMO you tend to get less racism in rural areas than you do in suburbs but when you get it it's not as obscured. It's a million times more about class and culture than it is about race.
As an openly transgender person, I had the same thought. Specifically, in the Bay Area I can be a walking pride flag, and in fact strike up conversations with all kinds of people in all kinds of places and feel very connected. There's all kinds of community here that I haven't found other places I've lived.
In a lot of parts of the country I have to be very careful about what I say and how I present.
In a lot of other countries, my very existence is criminalized.
If your wife wears a hijab, then you are right, you will need to stick to a few very specific parts of the US. The good news is that in those parts, you'll probably find a thriving Muslim community to interact with.
I find it so incredibly ironic that it was immigrants, fleeing countries utterly lacking in comfort, wealth, or happiness, in search of a better life for themselves and their children, that helped build the comfortable industrialized nation of the United States.
It seems life - human existence - is cyclical and has amnesia. We forget too quickly what real discomfort is. Or at least, fail to strike a proper balance.
America was indeed founded by immigrants seeking a "better life" whether that was Puritans fleeing persecution or economic opportunists. It's not like anyone immigrated to America simply to "pioneer" for pioneering's sake.
By that standard you could say that every decision made by everyone is made in pursuit of a better life. Which is true, sure, but it obfuscates certain arguably important points.
Industrialized nations mistake comfort and wealth for happiness