The French, not known for being prudes, have drawn the line at sexualizing children. When Vogue published photos in 2010 of a heavily made up little girl wearing skintight clothing, heels and expensive jewelry, with her tiny little lips all puckered up, France was outraged.

While the magazine insisted that it only wanted to portray young girls’ fantasies of being like their mothers, many in France didn’t buy it. Especially Jouanno, who’s been trying to ban the “Mini-Miss” contests since 2011.

“It is extremely destructive for a girl between the ages of 6 and 12 to hear her mother say that what’s important for her is to be beautiful,” Jouanno said in the New York Times. “We are fighting to say: What counts is what they have in their brains.”

I wish this type of thinking would catch on more widely.