Today’s quotation comes from the trailer to a forthcoming documentary on the game of hockey in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics:

Why you suffering so much? Why you play for the guy who doesn’t respect us as a human being?

Here’s the trailer in full:

Compare and contrast that viewpoint with a quotation from future NHL Hall of Famer Jaromir Jagr, who told The Atlantic‘s Jeffrey Taylor in 2008, when he had fled North America to play in Russia’s Kontinental Hockey League, that

“I had hoped to sign with New York, and that didn’t happen. But I came to Omsk because I wanted to. Here in Russia, you have the real freedom, which is not like U.S. freedom. Back there you have so many rules.” He smiled.

“If the police stop you [in the U.S.] because you’re going too fast, they can put you in jail. But sometimes you just need to go fast. Here, you always have choices”—including, he seemed to imply, bribing one’s way out of trouble.

I’m not sure which country — Russia or the United States — Jagr says more about in those few sentences.