Issa Arden, a member of the social media team for I.M.L., said that having Mr. Mushtaq compete this year could broaden the gay subculture’s appeal to racial, ethnic and religious minorities. “The more fully you see people that are different in various ways, the more you see an embrace of everything that leather can be,” said Ms. Arden, one of a small group of women at I.M.L. “Having someone Muslim or noticeably brown or who is well built but smaller of stature, it’s all of those things.”

But publicity has been a mixed bag. Mr. Mushtaq said that while most of the feedback he received had been positive, he also got text messages calling him “an ugly, dirty Muslim” and a “terrorist.” He has also met fellow leather folk who think “that being Muslim is the antithesis of being progressive,” he said.

Although he calls himself a Muslim (he studied Arabic and the Quran as a child), Mr. Mushtaq says his relationship to Islam today is “an ethnic identity as opposed to a fundamentalist religious identity.” He adheres devoutly to some elements of the faith (he doesn’t eat pork), and more casually to others (“I’m a very light drinker”). His Islam is not “the crazy people with the swords,” as he put it, but professionals “who consider themselves Muslim” and who “might approve of gay marriage.”

Mr. Mushtaq was born in California to Pakistani immigrant parents and came out as gay in high school in conservative Orange County at 15. But it wasn’t until he attended California State University, Fullerton, that he discovered he was “bored being gay.”

“I wanted to be more edgy, the libertine that everyone gossiped about and called a slut,” said Mr. Mushtaq, whose chatty, giggle-prone personality may seem at odds with the stereotype of an order-barking leatherman.