What is it that makes a fashion icon? What, exactly, are the criteria? The magazines would have you believe that it involves some innate quality, a certain sense of je ne sais quoi that one cannot manufacture, that just is. It is a level of chic to which plebs such as you and I can only aspire, an elegance which prompts Brad Pitt to reach such heights of ecstatic admiration that he grows a beard, stops washing his hair, and spontaneously recites poetic non-sequiturs with the steely gravitas of an undergraduate at a slam poetry event. Being iconic is not something that can be learned. Of course, being French helps, as does inherited wealth, a 24-inch waist, and chuffs that smell pleasingly of Chanel No 5 as you waft by your admirers in the foyer of the Savoy.

Or so I thought anyway, as I flicked idly through the pages of the divine bible that is Grazia magazine, noting as I went that Kate Moss had made the best-dressed list for another year in a row. Mais oui. She has all the criteria, this icon of our times. Gold dress! Luxurious tresses! Even continence, a quality which I think you'll find has been a fashion "must have" ever since Coco Chanel once shat herself on a yacht in front of the 2nd Duke of Westminster. OK, so I made up that last bit, but the point I'm trying to make is that most glorious fashion goddesses of our time have had absolutely no problem going to the potty. At least, until now.

If you needed any proof that the end of the world is due on Fridayy, then just take a look at this week's Grazia, wherein an entire double-page spread is dedicated to the wardrobe of Harper , the 18-month-old child of David and Victoria Beckham, accompanied by the kind of breathless, fashion journalist-y prose that makes me want to put on what my boyfriend calls his "Thailand trousers" and crawl into a solitary mountaintop cave like a dying cat behind a sofa. "Over the past year, Little Miss Beckham, in Chloé, Burberry, and Stella, has established herself as the arbiter of toddler taste", writes an Actual Grown Woman, with no real sense of irony. I am really quite embarrassed for her.

The Beckhams' tendency to farm out their children to the gods of fashion is well known (just look at little Romeo Beckham and the coverage his participation in the Burberry campaign has garnered) yet the way that magazines seem to lap it up is becoming all the more disturbing. Certainly, it starts younger with the girls, whose outfits are analysed, praised, and criticised from toddlerdom. Suri Cruise has now endured six years of this scrutiny, at a time when most children are rolling around woolly jumpers encrusted with a mixture of snot, puddle, and sick. One can only hope that the royal baby will be a boy, and thus granted the (relative) freedom of having no one give a toss about his trousers.

Much has been made of Mail Online's hypocritical stance on "child protection". The newspaper may ostensibly condemn the sexualisation of young girls, with its daily trips to Outrage Mountain because of Playboy-themed stationery, or sexting, or the big, bad internet. But then its "sidebar of shame" is given over to bikini-clad teenage tits, to little girls "all grown up" with their "lithe" limbs and "exhibitionist" posing. Little Lolitas hailed as "mature beyond their years" as they sunbathe by the pool and paparazzi capture their bodies with long lenses. Meanwhile, the Sun runs stories about child beauty pageants that purport to be critical but have headlines such as '"CAVORTING provocatively in a tiny pink swimsuit and clutching a cuddly stuffed kitten, little Ocean Orrey struts her stuff in a British beauty pageant – aged just FOUR." It's essentially clickbait for perverts.

The sex abuse allegations surrounding Jimmy Savile, as well as the evidence given at the Leveson inquiry, has meant that the sexualisation of young girls by tabloid media has come under increased scrutiny. Last week a greetings card with the message 'You're 13 today! If you had a rich boyfriend, he'd give you diamonds and rubies, well maybe next year you will – when you've bigger boobies!' was widely condemned as creepy and wrong. And yet the behaviour of certain women's magazines, as well as the fashion industry in general, remains relatively unchecked. The 90s saw a 16-year-old Kate Moss coerced into baring her breasts for a photo shoot, but every year the girls are getting younger. Earlier this year, Grazia featured an interview and photo shoot with 12-year-old Mad Men star Kiernan Shipka, in which it bleated about how she had "the fashion-savvy of a front row regular" as she posed in a mini-skirt, and now we have a toddler being hailed as our spiritual fashion queen.

While we're ever so keen to point out the hypocrisies of the tabloid media, barely anyone bothers with rags like Grazia. They're just frivolous fluff, no one takes them seriously. No one, except perhaps your daughter who sneaked your copy into her bedroom or read it in the hairdressers. She'll be getting the message loud and clear; that for girls, it's the quality of your accessories, the cut of your dress, and the litheness of your limbs that counts. Before you can shit in a pot, or have worked out that that dolled-up, made-up kid in the mirror is you. Before you can even speak.