>much happier to skip a meeting if they'll still hear about what happens afterwards.

If you're just a 'follower' of what's going on, that's fine. The problem shows up when you have some stakeholder or steering ability.

If you miss meeting about X and don't bring up discussion about Y then other person A may not talk about Z that affects X. But I agree that every meeting should have a point and total number of meetings should be minimized.