Damn, that last quip is really poisoning the well here. As a maintainer, not being paid for my projects or contributions, I have every right to decide how and if I want to accept contributions.

Do you need to "maintain" a complex project? Why can't you just add the patches you want on your fork and update as far as it suits you? Just as the upstream doesn't have to review or accept PRs, neither do you. Users can still see the network of forks, and ime there are few that are actively updated.