So I finally took matters into my own hands. I installed all the dev packages for gtk required to build the gaim source package (one of which removed all of my gnome themes, including the one I was using, gee thanks), dinked with the debian package stuff from the existing one, and made my own gaim. It seems to have worked miracuously, and I'm back on IM. So much for debian as the "Easy-to-configure-and-use-wonder-distro". Thanks to Jan de Groot, who in another language posted the tip.
I could have I supposed just built it from source after I installed the dev packages. I do with installing libgtk2.0-dev hadn't uninstalled a bunch of themes and graphics though; the defaults are prtty flat.
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