A vicious cycle

Detached rationale
Decaying morale
Divorcing ourselves from remorse

Mercy's decay
Rotting away
Compassion snuffed out at the source

Victims of a cold indifference
Are they so much less than we?
Nurturing a deficiency of conscience
Lost in our grandiose reality

Condoning through silence
Unwarranted violence
Against those that we should defend

Compassion rejected
Humanity neglected
This cycle must come to an end

Turn a blind eye
So quick to deny
The suffering of those with no voice

If it can happen to them
It can happen to us
It's only a matter of choice

With lower forms labeled expendable
A terrible lesson is taught
The value of all life is lessened
A departure from rational thought

When acts of viciousness go uncondemned
Our minds become warped and jaded
The value of life in our clouded eyes
Is slowly minimized and degraded

Morality and mercy deferred
'til their notion is all but deceased
An ignorance born of vanity
Denying the pain of the beasts

Exploited for simple amusement
Cruelty for cruelty's sake
Desensitization transcends
A connection that we simply cannot seem to make

Spiraling out of control
Seeds of violence will grow
Morphing into an ugliness
Upon which reason cannot be bestowed

Conditioned by social acceptance
The perverse becomes common place
Brutality rotates in full circle
A monstrosity we all must face