Wayferer, this is great. Thank you for taking the time to put all that out. Currently I'm out to dinner (pacific time in the U.S) but I will definitely get back to you tonight sometime. These are good points, and while I think some of the issues are a product of conceived use of my language and not what the particular words, e.g., "before" are what I mean to mention.. that's a fault on my part, and clearing that up is a very useful exercise (if possible)

Well I will eventually do my dissertation on Nietzsche despite being analytic. I hope the juxtaposition of Nietzsche and idealists was limited to your mentioning Rorty, and not that there's a case to be made there, though!

Right. This is a typical hang-up, and I think a crucial point. In a sense, yes. It is not possible to have a perspective-free view of something. Nor is that the goal of realism, but those "beings" are foundational. There were things around before there were living things, to be simple. Doesn't mean we can know them before being here, or in all their detail, but we are possible because of them.

When I write, I try to articulate the difference by using the word generativity. A real being has existence and a nature that is independent of cognition, e.g., cognition (nor a particular mind) doesn't generate the existence, or whole nature of the thing. Now, cognition might add to the nature of the thing (and sensory means might be selective) or the way in which the thing exists - something might be colored for us and not for a dog (which brings up a whole different discussion of essentialism of a non-reified/platonic/metaphysical variety - but rather essentialism as a logical tool [neo-Aristotelian, Veatch took this road])
... but the point is that what allows for and, in part, what generates our knowledge of the thing is not reducible to cognition.

So, perhaps not very adequately at times or at all, we can come to know this remainder. This is still not perspective independent knowledge, but that's not the point of realism. We need not know all of reality at once, nor in all it's detail.

The point of realism is that a real being comes prior to cognition, and is what it is, before it is (which is not to say it is as you and I may see it, right now!) in any way determined by cognition - by virtue of this we are not trapped within cognition's bounds, if you will. The first premise of that is against idealism, the second is against Kant and others. Hume and even Russell.
We are always within a perspective, but the nature of things can be known in a way that is not wholly reducible to or generated by that perspective. Think metaphysically passive, but epistemologically active when it comes to cognition.

The path to that nature is difficult, but (I suggest, as a thought experiment, very tentatively and not with foolproof examples) you could consider small cross section of reality that is salient in an inter-perspectival sense (maybe not color, but physicality, or motion, or light, etc.)

I can elaborate on this point, from the same paper:

(a) A real being is a being whose existence and nature is independent of its being thought about or, in general, being cognized. Its existence and nature is not dependent upon the fact that it may be an object of awareness. Note carefully, therefore, that mental or psychological activities, since they do not have to be objectified or known in order to exist or be what they are, are not mind-dependent in the sense contrasted with real beings. On the contrary, they are a subset of real beings.
(b) A being of reason is a being whose existence and nature is dependent on its being thought about. It is an object-of-thought, or more exactly, an object-of-awareness. It would be wrong, however, to identify a being of reason with the psychological activities sufficient for its existence. A being of reason is in principle distinct from a real being— regardless of whether it be physical or psychological—for a being of reason only exists in relation to some knower. It is for that reason an objective being. A real being does not exist only in relation to some knower. It does not require a subject to which to be related. It could, then, contrary to what is common in English usage, be termed a "subjective" being, be it physical or psychological.
(c) A physical being is a being whose existence is independent of mental or psychological activities. Sometimes a physical being is also called a "real" being in order to indicate the dependency of the psychological on the physical, but not vice-versa. In other words, mental or psychological activities do not exist apart from physical states, such as neurological conditions of the brain, but physical states can exist apart from mental or psychological activities. This is, of course, not to say the mental or psychological can be reduced without remainder to the physical.
(d) A mental or psychological being is an activity of a particular mind or consciousness. It is important to note that while a mental or psychological being, for example, an act of perceiving or of conceiving, cannot exist apart from a particular knower, a being of reason, for example, the concept of hydrogen or the character Hamlet, is independent of any particular knower. It is, however, not independent of every particular knower, tout court.

The word being, I think, comes from the tradition this particular philosopher comes from. But yes, it would be bad if it was left undefined.

Thanks! I didn't know that, that's a high percentage. But I wouldn't limit the opponents to idealism. Anti-realism takes many forms, not limited to, but importantly, the Kantian constructivist view. I see Putnam as an opposition force, too

Awesome, thanks!

Could you point me in the direction of something concise that lays out the problem you suggest?

And well, there is no necessity to have full, or even robust knowledge of what they are - apart from a mind. This would be a move back to a God's Eye perspective on reality, which is impossible, yes.

The issue would be that what we are able to know is generated, or allowed for, metaphysically by that the nature of the thing as it is apart from cognition. Rather than, on the other hand, only knowing products of cognition or our own cognitive processes.

I'm not sure how it would go for post-quantum things, but a way to think about it opposed to perspective-independent views might be: are there aspects of the thing in question that would be salient, were many (non-human) beings able to perceive them - such an aspect, it seems, would not be reducible to cognition yet hint perspective independent.

(I recognize that might not be very clear)