RIP Taylor Swift: buried by Kim Kardashian West on 18 July. Or so those gleefully celebrating the supposed downfall of megastar Swift want the obituary to go.

Many hundreds of thousands people seem to have been waiting for this moment for years: Swift’s pedestal has begun to crumble beneath her feat. The unstoppable force of her success combined with her image management has met – with a thundering crash – the immoveable object that is the Kardashian publicity-generating machine.

On Monday Kardashian West published video of Swift seeming to approve Kanye West’s controversial Famous lyric – an approval Swift’s camp has been forcefully denying. But even before that, Swift’s star was already under siege.

Taylor Swift is so annoying; she is the next Anne Hathaway. Taylor Swift’s’s 4 July party was a “self-loving, narcissistic shriekfest”. Is Taylor Swift bad for Tom Hiddleston’s career?

The above are real critiques in real news articles and commentary pieces, published by reputable news outlets. The predictable backlash that has been brewing against Swift for a couple of years is finally reaching crescendo.

It was only a matter of time before the talented, successful, unapologetic, in-control young woman was fodder for critics, reduced to comparisons to “annoying” Anne Hathaway and almost-annoying Jennifer Lawrence (notice it’s never men who are annoying?), “Mean Girls gone wild”, and the hashtags #taylorswiftisoverparty and #KimExposedTaylorParty.

Ryan Caldwell (@ryancald) Taylor Swift is that girl everyone wants at first before realizing that she's literally a psychopath #KimExposedTaylorParty

Vannia Aranda (@vee_088) @KimKardashian I have never loved you so much...I never thought I'd say this, but thank you #KimExposedTaylorParty

Emily (@VilledaEmily23) Finally someone stood up to her😂 #KimExposedTaylorParty

The door to the latest round of vicious commentary was opened by Swift’s apparently heavily stage managed appearances with Hiddleston as her new boyfriend. That the pair want to be seen together is obvious – nobody goes on a date to the Colosseum in an effort to avoid crowds – but it is Swift who has been the lightning rod for the ridiculous commentary on it. Hiddleston, meanwhile, is treated as though he is an infant under the spell of some wicked witch (so goes the gendered implication), with no agency of his own.

“He hates that he has become a joke,” the Hollywood Gossip reported, about how “trapped” the rich and famous grown man is. “It’s hard for him to prove that to everybody because of how insistent Taylor is that everything that they do with each other is photographed.”

Vox dissected the commentary thus: “Somehow, as many angry observers implied, Hiddleston, and his smooth-as-silk British accent, was supposed to be better than this … and, by proxy, deserving of someone better than Swift.”

A series of aggressive tweets from her ex-boyfriend Calvin Harris sent thousands of people to Swift’s Instagram to leave a snake emoji. Instead of focusing on how hilarious it was that Swift wrote a hit song for him under a male pseudonym, the media concentrated on the fact that Harris did not like the way she made it public.

Swift deserves critique for her brand of feminism, which is part friendship-as-beauty-pageant mixed with individualism on steroids. Is she a master manipulator of the media? Without a doubt. And Kanye was right: Single Ladies is a better song and video than You Belong With Me.

No person is without fault, but none of the above warrants the viciousness with which Swift is torn into. She does not deserve to be labelled an “obnoxious Nazi barbie”, for a start.

At the heart of the coverage of Tay-Tay/Hiddleswift are themes as old as the Bible: suspicion of successful women, resentment of unapologetic women, a need for women to know their place.

This of course is not just about Swift; she hardly needs me rushing to her defence. It’s about the public discourse around young women: the way we still talk and write about their success, and the uncomfortable way we treat their sexuality. Why else would we criticise the number of boyfriends Swift has had, and the swiftness with which she moved on from Harris to become Hiddleswift.

When stories are published calling Taylor “insane” and a “control freak”, and when entire Tumblr threads are devoted to how “annoying” she is, we’re sending a message to young girls and women: You are not allowed to be seen enjoying your success or your sexuality – and you are certainly not to appear to think you deserve either.

Justin Bieber caused thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to his neighbour’s property by egging it, and allegedly spat on his fans. He repeatedly storms off stage in the middle of concerts and talks openly about his relationships – yet he still can be redeemed.

Swift writes catchy songs about some ex-boyfriends, appears surprised when she wins awards, complains about how she has been represented in a Kanye West song, and is never photographed with a hair out of place. Those are her crimes. And they are apparently unforgivable.

Before her, Hathaway’s crimes were crying when she won an Oscar – and obviously wanting to win an Oscar. Lawrence’s was being too goofy. Meanwhile, Woody Allen continues to make movies, Bill Murray is a loveable but curmudgeonly old fella’ and Terry Richardson is a feted photographer.

Swift is the only woman to win the Grammy for album of the year twice; she has sold 40m albums worldwide and has written the vast majority of her own hits. If she seems little intense, it probably has something to do with why she is so wildly successful, yet we remain determined to reduce her – in her own tongue-in-cheek words – to a nightmare dressed like a daydream.