You can still enable remote work while putting guard rails around the need for video conferencing due to the cognitive load and emotional drain it clearly causes.
> My experience is that the people who love video is highly correlated with people who love useless meetings.
Strong agree. If you want your video on, I am cool with that. If you want it off, also cool. If you're not present, I'm going to know either way, but I want you to be comfortable while we work together. I care about the output and outcomes, not the control. n=1, ymmv, etc.
As a big advocate of remote work, over the years I'm coming to agree with this less and less. Done well, remote work is great. Done poorly, it's killing me. It often saps me of energy even more than office work did somehow.
On days at the office I get less done in terms of 'amount of work' but it feels more satisfying than remote, because it gives the feeling of better understanding situations and being able to do the right thing at the right moment.