In the effort to articulate political theory and psychoanalysis, two psychoanalytic metaphors—symptom and sublimation—have been separately used by political theorists to explain the emergence of populism and its relationship with democracy. Going back to the works of Freud and Lacan, this paper provides a critical reassessment of the uses of these two psychoanalytic metaphors by authors such as Ernesto Laclau, Chantal Mouffe, and Benjamin Arditi. The paper concludes that the two metaphors are complementary, as the distinction between symptom and sublimation is key to differentiating between undemocratic and radical democratic constructions of popular identities.