Don't do me like that

[the phantom]

I see this thread is off an running in a direction of its own

Well, if that be the case, I will go back to the very first post and respond to that. Surely that will put me back on track.

Don't bring in the real world to justify the absence of females in the Fellowship

Why shouldn't I?

If the Fellowship was made up of some species of bug-eyed green martians with six genders, then I would have no business bringing up the real world to justify the members of the Fellowship because there is no real world experience with bug-eyed green martians with six genders.

However, we are dealing with two genders, not six, and those two genders exist in our world. Also, we are dealing primarily with humans, not martians, and humans exist in our world as well. It doesn't matter what genre you are doing- historical drama, fantasy, or sci-fi. No matter what type of book the human is in, a human is a human and male and female are male and female and thus real world rules apply to humans in books unless the author says otherwise.

For instance, it would not be acceptable if Aragorn got his head sliced off in one scene and simply placed it back on his shoulders and continued fighting. Humans don't do that. You can't toss that into a book simply because its genre is fantasy. That's stupid.

Middle Earth has mountains, rivers, cliffs, oceans, and forests just like our world. They fight with the same weapons we have in our world. You see, Tolkien didn't create a totally different world. It's our world with elves, dwarves, dragons, and a bit of magic sprinkled in.

The real world most certainly has a place when discussing things in Tolkien's books if they are things that exist in the real world. The real world is what a normal person uses to define something.