In one scene of the HBO comedy series "I Love LA," Charlie (Jordan Firstman), Alani (True Whitaker) and Tallulah (Odessa A’zion) attend the funeral of Catholic social media sensation, Landry, whom Charlie styled. What should be a serious moment about the death of a young, rising star is instead filled with humorous quips reflecting Charlie’s apathy toward the situation. He gawks and asks the doorman to “check the list” when told he’d have to go to the overflow section, has a one-sided stand-off with his long-term ex-situationship and calls the funeral priest “boring.”

To the uninitiated, Charlie's antics can be written off as mean and insensitive, but in watching the rest of the show, I realized his behavior exemplifies a certain phenomenon impacting modern youth.

The characters of "I Love LA" have a uniquely zillennial way of speaking. Everything is ironic, sardonic and........

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