Featured on their second studio album, Meat Is Murder (1985), the song has a lyric condemning child abuse and a funk-inspired track based around Andy Rourke's bass line.

"Barbarism Begins at Home" was co-written by lead vocalist Morrissey and guitarist Johnny Marr at the band's rehearsal room in Manchester.

"[3] Musically, the song is a funk-influenced track built around Andy Rourke's repetitive bassline and Johnny Marr's Chic-influenced guitar riffing.

The song was a callback to Marr and Rourke's pre-Smiths time in the instrumental group Freak Party, which also featured Simon Wolstencroft, future drummer of the Fall.

Running beyond seven minutes, 'Barbarism...' certainly stands well apart from The Smiths' tightly constructed chart-botherers, and – despite Morrissey's best intentions, penning a lyric that studied the effects of domestic child abuse – it's a remarkably fun, smile-inducing listen".

[9] "Barbarism Begins at Home" was first performed live in December 1983 at a concert at Trinity College Dublin, nearly a year before they recorded it for Meat Is Murder.

[10] At a concert at the Royal Albert Hall in April 1985, the band performed the song with Dead or Alive's Pete Burns, who duetted with Morrissey on lead vocals.