Academic debates are a core sense-making mechanism of scientific and democratic societies that serve the purpose of educating the public and helping society to achieve further clarity on debated topics. This research seeks to understand why manifestations of the shadow may occur in academic debates on YouTube and how the shadow plays a role in making these debates less productive while breeding divisiveness. The scholarly debate genre on YouTube is an extension of the recognized television genre of televised debate and a description is given about the ways that the YouTube medium may influence the performance of and the viewing of academic debates. An analysis of ten videos that reflect the scholarly debate YouTube genre is done and explained through the dimensions of aggression, dismissiveness, avoiding, and logical fallacies. Shadow manifestations stand in the way of productive debates by distracting the debaters and the audience from the pursuit of the truth, confusing viewers with the use of logical fallacies, and promoting divisiveness that stands in the way of achieving consensus.