Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-17045460-20130610203543/@comment-9887604-20130620173751

They definitely were enslaved before they went blind, they went blind from a regimen of poisonous mushrooms introduced into their stable diet by the Dwemer.

They seem to be doing just fine as is being blind. One could imagine that being able to see would not do them much good being located in the darkest caverns in all of Tamriel. The Dwemer were trying their hand at large scale physical re-engineering.