Mostly they're serfs hired from the big
landowners; it's a fact you can easily verify that permission to join
the labor-companies at the polar mines is regarded as a privilege,
granted as a reward or denied as a punishment. And most of the geek
landowners are bitterly critical of the way we treat our labor at the
mines; they claim we make them dissatisfied with the treatment they
get at home."
"Of course, they're always glad to have the peasants taken off their
hands during a slack agricultural season," Blount added, "and we train
workers to handle contragravity power-equipment. I won't deny that
there's a lot of unnecessary brutality on the part of the native
foremen and overseers, which we're trying, gradually, to eliminate.
You'll have to remember, though, that we're dealing with a naturally
brutal race."
"Of course, mistreatment of native labor is always blamed on other
natives, never on the gentle and kindly Terrans," she replied. "That's
been SOP on every planet our Association's had any experience with."
"Now look; you just came here from Niflheim," von Schlichten objected.
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