Representation of social groups

Social groups are represented differently on different TV dramas. For example, usually on detective dramas, males are the detectives and are seen as the strong stereotypical type. This has always been the case apart from the small number of female detectives which have appeared on our TVs in the past 30 years or so.
Depending on what the TV drama is, the social groups will be represented differently. For example, on a programme such as Downtown Abbey, women are viewed to be lower than the men socially, as it is set in the past when women had less rights than males.
If it is a modern day drama such as Waterloo Road, we see that men and women have the same rights most of the time and we see a clear difference on how social groups are represented through time and different TV dramas.