I prefer to run with headphones and will race with them in most road races because I feel it give me an advantage, which for me is not having to hear myself breath, in addition to a few other minor plusses. However, I have raced successfully without them and am not broken up about not being able to race without them.
Perhaps this is contradictory, and I would certainly make the argument if I were my own devil's advocate, but while it stands to reason to prohibit them in cross country (although, since I'm good friends with the local USATF guy in my association, I have run in them in cross country races, too) and track races, I think in road races, for the most part, it makes sense to allow them. We are talking about mid to back of the pack runners who really are not competing; and the few of us that are relatively competitive and up toward the front, what is the harm besides to the egos of the "real" runners running behind or beside me in my headphones.
However, what really annoys me about the issue is that while we have the governing body, USATF (who cares about the RRCA, really) telling us we can't wear them, and then we have USATF's effective parent company, Nike, marketing the hell out of IPod this, IPod that, run with your power song, and all that crap, completely catering to all those recreational runners, training them for that local 5k or 10k and then, low and behold, they go out to another local race in their community that has chose to enforce the USATF rules, and they get DQed or told, nope, can't wear them. (Sorry about the run on sentence) Ultimately, I just deal and either run without worrying about being DQed or I find another race if I care about my time being recorded. The duplicity just bothers me.