A Series of Statistical Charts Illustrating the Condition of the Descendants of Former African Slaves - Maps show comparison of African American population in the United States with several European countries and Australia [LCCN2013650368]
The pattern
This still is filed under Data as proof.
Define
A chart, map, or count that is the argument, not an illustration next to the argument.
Mechanism
Sighted evidence. The reader is asked to believe their eyes: a bar, a share, a spread on a map.
Verdict
The claim is comparative or quantitative and the figure can be read without a caption doing the sell.
Why it works
The rhetorical work is done by figure-ground, not by scale: eight nations are hollow crimson line and one shape is solid black, so the eye lands on the American figure first and everything else becomes context for it. Centring that shape and letting the others float around it makes the page an argument about position, not just size. The bilingual title is not politeness - it hands a French audience the claim in their own language and removes the American frame entirely. Outlines are drawn at true relative country size rather than scaled to population, which keeps the plate honest and makes the reader do the comparison by reading the numbers, not by trusting the drawing.
Steal this when
Steal this when your number is dismissed as small because of the container it is reported inside, and you need to re-anchor it against a set the audience already respects. The hollow-outline-plus-one-solid treatment is the right move whenever a single item must be lifted out of a comparison set without enlarging it.