Besides the opponents of the bill, a dozen topless activists from the Ukrainian-based women's movement Femen had shown up to stage a counter-protest dressed as nuns and chanting "humourous" slogans, said French feminist writer and columnist Caroline Fourest. "When they moved toward the demonstrators, some of (the protesters) ran after them, raging," Fourest said in a phone call with AFP from a police wagon, where the women had been taken for their own safety. She claimed the women were hit by their pursuers, who also lashed out at journalists filming the scene.

Several photographers were roughed up, an AFP photographer said. The local police station said officers had made five arrests. President Francois Hollande's government and its allies sharply criticised the aggression. French Socialist party first secretary Harlem Desir denounced it as "stupid", and government spokeswoman Najat Vallaud-Belkacem said authorities would take a zero-tolerance stance on violence. "There is no place for the extreme right's acts of aggression in our country," Vallaud-Belkacem said. "The government will show no tolerance for this violence. Family Minister Dominique Bertinotti said violence was "intolerable" and went against French values. "We cannot tolerate violence, homophobic sentiments, they are punishable under the law," the minister said on Europe 1 radio.

The debate at Celina High School started after two female high school students celebrated the high school's "Twin Day" last week by wearing shirts to school that read "Lesbian 1" and "Lesbian 2" on the back. They were promptly asked to remove the T-shirts, according to students there.

On Tuesday, some 20 students decided to show their support of the girls by wearing their own T-shirts to school. The shirts read: "I support..." with a photo of a rainbow. "Express yourself."

Jimmy Walter, a sophomore at the public high school, says he organized the T-shirts in defense of his older sister, one of the female students who wore the Twin Day shirts. "My sister got yelled at and screamed at [by administrators], and she was basically told she was unwanted at the school because she was gay," he says.

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"Our high) school promotes their pro-life club called the 'Students for Life". They have their own shirts, which have a fetus and promotes pro-life," Warner wrote on Reddit, in a post about the incident that has now gone viral on the social news site. "How is that not considered "political"?