Consent can be withdrawn from ongoing actions, but pregnancy is not an action someone actively “participates” in the way they participate in a game, a workout, or a medical procedure. Pregnancy is a foreseeable biological consequence that follows from consenting to sex. When someone consents to an action, they also accept the known risks and outcomes that can reasonably result from that action—even if those outcomes are unwanted.
Revoking consent after a consequence has already occurred does not undo the original choice to take the risk. The decision to engage in sex is the moment at which consent is relevant; pregnancy is what follows from that decision, not something that can later be retroactively vetoed. Treating pregnancy as if it were an ongoing activity misdescribes its nature and shifts responsibility away from the initial choice that caused it.
An analogy helps clarify this. If you place a bet in a casino with clear rules, you cannot wait to see the outcome and then declare that you no longer consent to losing. The fact that you dislike the result does not invalidate the agreement you knowingly entered. Even when the outcome involves a continuing obligation rather than a single event, the logic remains the same. If you accept a deal where losing creates an ongoing responsibility, you cannot later claim that responsibility disappears simply because it lasts over time.
In the same way, consenting to sex while knowing that pregnancy can result means accepting that possibility. Consent cannot be selectively revoked only after a foreseeable consequence has occurred, especially when doing so would require ending the life of another human being.
Key Takeaways
Consent applies to actions, not to the natural consequences that follow from freely chosen actions.
Accepting a known risk means accepting responsibility for its outcomes, even when those outcomes are ongoing or burdensome.
Revoking consent after the fact does not morally erase the original choice or its effects.
Pregnancy cannot be treated like an optional activity without ignoring the dependent human life that already exists.