"That Kirk did not explicitly advocate for the stoning of gays to death, in the strictest sense and syntax of those words, is therefore a distinction without a difference – unless, like Kirk, you’re a liar. In that case, the distinction between saying what you’re saying and not saying what you’re saying is important. If that collapses, so does your deception. As long as the distinction between what is said and what is intended to be understood is in place, it’s possible to bully people into silence. That’s what happened to Stephen King and others. They spoke the truth about Kirk – not the strict letter of it but the true spirit of it – but did not have the courage to stand by the truth after being accused of slander. And in the process of apologizing, they ended up affirming the lie, making it grow bigger, such that a USA Today story about King’s apology says that he “repeatedly apologized for a false accusation.” (After all, it must have been false if Stephen King apologized for it.)"