But none of them are laughing when they say it!
Does my head in.
That's the thing. They are. Saying the word is their substitute for the act of laughing.
The thing to understand about the post 2000 born, and especially the post 2010 born internet generation is that they are not just constantly glued to their phones and computers and their spacebook and myface of what ever it's called but that they actually grew up with them.
What this means is that their upbringing is not human in the same way yours or mine was. And I mean no insult to them by saying this. It's simply that their entire behavior is completely different on an almost biological level.
You see we humans learn by mimicking. This is especially true in our formative years as small children. And this extends not just to higher skills but also base behaviors like talking, walking and the way we unconsciously express emotions.
And that's the crux of the issue. Where as you and I were raised by people and among people and learned how to perform basic human behavior by mimicking other human beings they were raised by machines. And just like Tarzan who was raised by monkeys and could therefore speak monkey they speak only in the language of the machine. They literally newer developed the actual parts of their brains required to be humans as we would recognize.
So when you tell a joke and one of them just stares you down strait faced and exclaims lol in a completely flat monotone he is actually laughing. That's just the way his brain is wired to express that behavior just as you or I express it by expelling large quantities of air out of our lungs at a set cadence.
And things are only going to get worse as time goes on. Right now there are still plenty of us old model humans around for them to look at and copy. But in a few generations when we all die out the world will be populated entirely by expressionless monotone individuals devoid of all body language and "human" behavior communicating entirely through the vocal equivalent of the monotone text you can find on the internet.