It was marginal to begin with because of the following site guideline: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize." That applies to stories as well as comments.
Since there's no reason to assume that the colloquial use of the English word "offensive" is the same as whatever legal term the French law invokes, the point is vapid and basically concern trolling. I think we can expect better from an HN discussion. Applying the site guideline I just quoted, one can foster a higher-quality discussion by assuming that the law writers are not completely stupid.
I'm pretty sure your example be rightly called as non-harassing ( unless you're not sharing additional context)
No. Laws do not work that way.