Conservative Daily Caller founder Tucker Carlson on Sunday suggested that the reason he had been unpopular with liberals for years was because “people despise you when you wear a bow tie.”

“How boring is it to wear a hoodie to work?” Carlson asked during a Fox News segment about how Americans were revolting against the tradition of dressing casually on Fridays. “If you are truly cutting edge you will wear gloves. White gloves.”

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One viewer in London noted that “bow tie Thursdays” were becoming popular at his workplace.

Carlson, who wore a bow tie for years while working as a host of CNN’s Crossfire, noted that he could have been “pummeled” for wearing the formal necktie if he had not believed in self defense.

“People despise you when you wear a bow tie,” he explained. “Not in Charleston, not in Newport, Rhode Island. There little strongholds of bow tie-philia. But the rest on the country — especially the Big Apple — not for the bow ties.”

“I mean, if you’re a Nation of Islam guy — in fact, they would come up to me often. They were so nice to me, it was unbelievable. The Nation of the [Louis] Farrakhan guys, they loved the bow tie.”

“Was your behavior better when you were wearing a bow tie?” Fox News co-host Alisyn Camerota wondered.

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“Oh, no,” Carlson admitted. “It was much filthier because, look, you’re wearing a bow tie so nobody suspects it.”

Watch this video from the Fox News’ Fox & Friends, broadcast Jan. 6, 2013.