Not long after purchase, I took our newish, kind-of-rescued pit breed puppy out to the small piece of grass by the hulking Lewisham estate that sits behind our twee block of new-build flats. A bunch of kids were playing football on the concrete pitch by the grass.

Suddenly, the kids started running towards us, screaming and yelling with their dark-coloured hoodies flaring behind them.

Christ, I thought. This is it. The dog’ll be pinched and I’ll be (oh, horrors) tomorrow’s Daily Mail lead – a nice, white, middle-aged lady with her handbag lifted and her old fanny raped by a horde of sweating newish Britons, and Paul Dacre just out of frame somewhere, wanking over the money shot into his ashtray (all marginally better than going out in obscurity, I guess, but not exactly how I wanted to leave).

In fact, things turned out – well, rather lower-key than that. The huge youths thundered up, said hello, and threw themselves onto the grass to play with the puppy.

‘Can I pet your dog?’

‘Is that a little pit?’

‘Is that a little staff? Sick, innit?’

‘What’s his name? How old is he?’ They kicked the football for the dog and ran around so that he could chase, and the dog got so excited that he wet himself all over the place. The kids all thanked me politely when it came time to leave.

Thus it has been ever after. This kind of dog opens doors, and eyes, to the truth of one’s own prejudices. Which anyone can see.

—

The working class has kept these dogs for many years.

Pit breed terriers: a much maligned dog type that was bred over several centuries for bear-baiting, and latterly, to fight other dogs for sport in pits. Has also long run a useful second line as a rodent killer.

Key characteristics: a sublime joi de vivre and affection for man through which one is occasionally privileged to glimpse eternity (which is not, you understand, because the dog is tearing your throat out). Pit dogs were bred for an unusually intricate, close relationship with humans, and to distinguish quickly between people and dogs: it was vital that they were able to turn off their aggression the moment someone stepped in the pit to handle them when they were wounded. Uniquely among animals, their instinct is to expect the best from man, and to trust him, even when they are injured.

Make no mistake – that magic is still there, and that is why they’re owned. It is true that a few people have turned a few of them to evil. But I know dogs very well. I have owned them all my life. I see very clearly that it’d take a real effort to teach these dogs to hate people. They can be dangerous with other dogs, because of their history, but not with people, because of their history. Our dog trainer says the same, as do most dog behaviourists. Nobody can say their dog won’t attack, but they can say they won’t encourage it.

Media management is also a problem: the rightwing mainstream press religiously reports all bull terrier attacks, but tends to ignore attacks by labradors, huskies, malamutes, jack russells, and all so on. The bull terrier in all its formats – pit bull in its many incarnations, English bull terrier, staffie – is a working man’s dog. The mainstream press enjoys nothing more than highlighting the sins of the working man – and, several times a year, the sins of a very small number of his pets.

—

One of the most amusing aspects of owning a pit breed dog is the speed at which tonier members of the middle class decide you’re working class, and that they are entitled to hate you for it. (It should be said that these tossers are absolutely in the minority: it’s just that they’re brilliant at giving the impression that theirs is the majority – only, even – view).

It’s not the dog they hate – like most well-treated pit breed animals, the dog is passionately pro-people and always acts like it, with the mad-wagging tail and obvious thrill at all overtures – it’s you. The fact of the dog simply gives the chichi the green light to take a swipe at the lower orders.

They don’t say a great deal to your face – probably, the instinct is to bottle out when it comes to approaching chavs directly. Instead, they go in for deep sighs, tsk-tsks, a lot of whispered and/or nasal ‘God, look at thems, tight lips and narrowed eyes.

‘That dog has got a muzzle on,’ a little blonde girl observed this morning at North Greenwich station.

‘Yessssss,’ her mother hissed over her shoulder like Iago. Sitting at feet at an outdoor cafe, the dog suddenly barked loudly for a biscuit. Mum and the blonde twitched, and beat it.

‘Is that a staff?’ a woman whispered loudly to her boyfriend at the traffic lights opposite the Maritime museum in Greenwich.

‘Sssssssssshhhhhhhh,’ he rasped theatrically, elbowing the girlfriend down the street a few feet, presumably out of harm’s way. His outfit caught the sun as they went: bright red cords and a shoulder bag so shiny that the dog could see shapes moving in it.

‘Ow,’ said the girlfriend.

‘Shut up,’ the boyfriend brayed. ‘SSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHH.’ By now, the dog was completely fascinated. His whole back end wagged. He strained to join in. It took a while to convince him to leave.

—

To be fair again, the hoity-toity reaction is not the most common. There are just a few imperious types who believe that they may openly spurn those who appear to have been born to the labouring classes. Most people seem to prefer to make their decision about an owner on the evidence of the dog – or, at least, to keep a civil tone when talking to a person with a pit breed on a lead.

‘That’s a happy dog,’ they’ll say as the dog rockets around, jumping up as young bull terriers do. Hearing our accents (one from the colonies, one very English middle class), people decide that the dog is a ridgeback. Others assume he is a rescue dog. The number of rescued staffies and pit mixes in Greenwich park seems to be on the rise: it may be that attempts to promote their positive aspects with potential rescuers are starting to work.

The dog plays with other big dogs – boxers, labs, a sloughi, schnauzers, pure bred staffs, and the staffs and pit mixes that people have rescued. The trick is to say something fast. People need to hear your accent. They’ll be polite after that. Nobody ever asks what people like us are doing with a dog like that.

Still writing, so more soon.