India, July 24 -- There is a particular kind of protest that belongs to this generation alone. It happens on the street, yes, with the batons and the tear gas and the running and the shouting. But it also happens simultaneously on a phone screen, in a reel, in a meme drafted in real time, captioned with a punchline that lands before the tear gas has cleared.

The Cockroach Janata Party's Chalo Sansad march on July 20 was, by any conventional measure, a day of confrontation and chaos in the heart of Delhi. It was also, in the hours that followed, a masterclass in how Generation Z processes political trauma and turns it immediately, almost reflexively, into something that makes you laugh before it makes you think.

As thousands of protester...