[@Pandora13]

Yeah, I think "the mutant metaphor" is more like a spread out thematic thing or a throughline that comes up more or less depending what media you're taking in your which comics. Some of the comics lean much heavier into standard superheroes-against-cataclysmic-disaster (except in the X-Men's case, it's almost always because they're mutants rather than they're caught up in somebody else's war etc). 

Hmmm...mascots is an interesting thought. 
I think they can be simultaneously that as well as mentors. 

(and Beast must get his stuff tailor made!)