Morgan Meis is adamantly pro-fort:
Take two identical objects, one built to be a toolshed and the other built as a fort. They look exactly the same. But once you know that one is a fort, it transforms. You approach it with diffidence, with the respect of someone entering a sacred space. That is why children hide their forts and surround them with all manner of booby traps. Special spaces require special measures. For the uninitiated to enter the fort is for the fort to be sullied, to have become polluted. When you are a child the last thing you want is for a parent (for instance) to enter the fort, bringing with them, inevitably, the stigma of the mundane. A parent can be allowed into the fort only under special circumstances and with a firm understanding that they will play by a different set of rules: fort rules. It is like trying to take communion when you’re unbaptized. You can put the wafer in your mouth a thousand times, but the mystery of transubstantiation will elude you.
(Hat tip: Utne)