As stated in http://docs.python.org/library/user (found via http://docs.python.org/genindex-Symbols), this file is an older customization hook that is deprecated. I (not a Python core dev, just a user) personally prefer the environment variable: I set it once in my .bashrc and every interactive python invocation uses it. (I admit that I have to cheat and import another module in order to be compatible from 2.4 to 3.1, but it’s not a big hurdle). Recent changes to the interpreter have added more envvars (PYTHONIOENCODING, PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE), so I don’t see people agreeing to the removal of the venerable PYTHONSTARTUP.

Your last argument can also be reverted: Everything that can be done via pythonrc can be done via PYTHONSTARTUP. The advantage of using an envvar is that it mirrors the behavior of a lot of programs: EDITOR, PAGER, MAILER, BROWSER, LESS, GPG_AGENT_INFO, SSH_AUTH_SOCK, GZIP, EMAIL, and so on. :-)

FTR, ignoring PYTHONSTARTUP can be done by unsetting the variable before launching python, or using python -E (which will ignore all envvars, not only this one).