Elves may be fictional creatures but the setting forgotten Realms describes pretty well how elves should look like. Disregard a whole setting because "Oh hey its fictional everything goes" actually don't give the setting proper respect.
Well, I don't think this setting deserves much respect. The D&D creators had no problems "borrowing" from Tolkien (and other authors) in the first place, and had no problems changing this lore once they got faced with a lawsuit.
