As many as one million protesters converged in Paris to protest President Francois Hollande’s intention to legalize same-sex marriage, although police put the number closer to three-hundred forty thousand.  In a country that is normally very liberal, many French citizens are not only opposed to same-sex marriage but same-sex adoption.  Most of those at the rally claimed  they are not homophobic but believe traditional marriage is between a man and a woman.  Hollande who swept in to power with a wave of support, has quickly become a highly controversial figure.  His plan to tax those earning over one million euros was recently declared unconstitutional by the French Supreme Court.  At the protest was comedian Frigide Barjot who called on Hollande to abandon his plans to legalize gay marriage.  She pointed out those who oppose gay marriage are “multi-cultural, multi-philosophical and multi-sexual.”  Even by protest-happy French standards, this was a large rally.  The most surprising part of the rally is the fact that civil unions have been legal for about ten years.  So it would seem the natural progression would be gay marriage.  In a recent opinion poll of one-thousand people, fifty-six percent were in favor of gay marriage but only fifty percent were in favor of gay adoption.  Patrice de Beer,a political analyst said, “President Hollande is not going to change his line despite the protests”. She continued, “It was one of his popular promises during his election campaign and for him it would be impossible to backtrack on this reform which is accepted by a majority of the French people.”  So despite the large protest, gay marriage will become law because Hollande has an absolute majority in Parliament, which means he is in the position to legalize gay marriage without having to be concerned about the opposition.