When I tried to install pidgin from the gnome overlay, eds was pulled down (missing eds use flag?) and libgweather was pulled down forcing gnome use flag on libsoup. I know it's the gnome overlay, but if the pidgin ebuild from that overlay ends to be the official pidgin ebuild, with proper use flags we should be able to have a GTK only pidgin.
We don't have pidgin in the gnome overlay. We don't even maintain it.