[thaumasiotes]

> Is there really a difference between "backwards e" and "upside down v"?

They're called schwa and wedge. This is actually a discussion I've had (not particularly fruitfully); schwa, being a reduced vowel, is sort of notionally only available in unstressed syllables. So you'd want to say a stressed syllable uses the wedge. But indeed they don't seem to be pronounced differently for many people, or at least not differently enough that there's an obvious answer. Merriam-Webster seems to use schwa even for stressed syllables like "stuff".