A good meeting lead can make sure they get everyone's input in a face to face without necessarily putting them on the spot. Sadly those are few and far in between.
I worked with one and they were excellent meetings. They got ideas out, and predicted possible issues better than any other meetings I've been part of.
I was mostly just making the counter point, however to expand on this, at least with the email thread you can take longer to compose your response or go talk to someone about it if you think it's important. It's viewed a bit weirder to follow up a face-to-face meeting with your counter points in an email.
But I actually just think communication is hard for a lot of people. Locking people in a room and expecting them to come up with a decision is a pretty poor way to work. Combining both text and talking, and giving enough time between discussion and decisions is probably a winner.
Seriously. I’ve always been a very good writer but people in STEM often aren’t.