Paper abortion, also known as a financial abortion, male abortion or a statutory abortion, is the proposed ability of the biological father, before the birth of the child, to opt out of any rights, privileges, and responsibilities toward the child, including financial support. By this means, before a child is born, a man would be able to absolve himself of both the privileges and demands of fatherhood.

The concept begins with the premise that when a woman becomes pregnant, she has the option of abortion, adoption, or parenthood. It argues, in the context of gender equality, that in the earliest stages of pregnancy the putative (alleged) father should have the same right to relinquish all future parental rights and financial responsibility — leaving the informed mother with the same three options. At present, the putative father is held financially responsible for a child no matter what the circumstances of conception ^[where?], including statutory rape of the father by the mother (see Hermesmann v. Seyer), and fraud (the mother used the father's sperm to become pregnant without his knowledge or consent).

The term "male abortion" was coined by Melanie McCulley, a South Carolina attorney, in a 1998 article, "The Male Abortion: The Putative Father's Right to Terminate His Interests in and Obligations to the Unborn Child". McCulley argued that men should be able to terminate their legal obligations to unwanted children. According to McCulley:

When a female determines she is pregnant, she has the freedom to decide if she has the maturity level to undertake the responsibilities of motherhood, if she is financially able to support a child, if she is at a place in her career to take the time to have a child, or if she has other concerns precluding her from carrying the child to term. After weighing her options, the female may choose abortion. Once she aborts the fetus, the female's interests in and obligations to the child are terminated. In stark contrast, the unwed father has no options. His responsibilities to the child begin at conception and can only be terminated with the female's decision to abort the fetus or with the mother's decision to give the child up for adoption. Thus, he must rely on the decisions of the female to determine his future. The putative father does not have the luxury, after the fact of conception, to decide that he is not ready for fatherhood. Unlike the female, he has no escape route (4).

In a 1996 article "Abortion and Fathers' Rights," philosopher Steven Hales made an argument that presupposes the following assertions:

Hales contends that the conjunction of these three principles is prima facie inconsistent and that this inconsistency should be eradicated by firstly acknowledging that men have no absolute duty to provide material support for their children, and secondly by admitting that fathers have the right of refusal. Philosopher Alex Naileg showed that similar premises indeed lead to a strict logical contradiction.

Laurie Shrage, professor of philosophy and women's and gender studies, questions whether men should be 'penalized for being sexually active', and she puts the subject in the perspective of feminists who had to fight the same idea with different gender portent, namely that consenting to sexual intercourse is not the same as consenting to parenthood. Furthermore, both men and children are punished, according to professor Shrage; children have to live with an absent father who never 'voluntarily' became a parent.

[If] women’s partial responsibility for pregnancy does not obligate them to support a fetus, then men’s partial responsibility for pregnancy does not obligate them to support a resulting child.