Children are dressed up in "mini-me" sexy clothes and allowed to wear make up and high heels because many parents no longer know right from wrong, a leading headmistress has warned.
Dr Helen Wright, president of the Girls' Schools Association (GSA) suggested there is something "intensely wrong" with society if some parents can see no problem with dressing their young child in provocative clothing.
In a speech to the GSA's annual conference in Bristol this week, she will raise concerns that many parents have been failed by the education system - brought up with no respect for their elders and little idea of how to raise a child.
Speaking ahead of the conference, Dr Wright, who is headmistress of St Mary's Calne, a private girls' boarding school in Wiltshire, told the Press Association that it was not the parents themselves that are to blame. "There are all these images in magazines and TV, if you're bombarded with that, you're going to think its normal, and actually it's not. It's becoming twisted," she said. "I don't blame the parents, I don't think it's their fault."
In her speech, Dr Wright will say: "I have a deep worry that some parents have been so deprived in their own lives of education and values, that they no longer know right from wrong and that they are as a result unwittingly 'indulging' children in some parallel universe where it is acceptable to let young children wear make-up and provocative clothing.
"If parents can't see anything wrong in dressing up their children in 'Future WAG' t-shirts and letting them wear make-up, high heels and 'mini-me' sexy clothing, then something is intensely wrong in our society.
"I have no doubt that these are the parents who have been failed by the education system themselves. These are the parents without support, experience or networks. They have grown up without any respect for their elders or any idea of how to bring up a child.
"How can they bring up their own children correctly if they have been failed themselves? But how do we break the cycle? Education, of course - and the support of schools embedded in their communities."
Dr Wright said she was not suggesting that parents need parenting classes, but she said that schools have a key role to play in providing guidance to parents, as well as help and support.
"We need to take away the stigma for parents that they have to know everything," she said. "I think there's lots of good advice out there, but people are afraid to be seen to be taking it."