HN is not more civil. Perhaps less likely to be distracted, but not nicer (if that's what you mean by civil)

likely less distracted, and more civil (in my experience anyway). but it varies by subreddit/topic I guess.

Choose a random article in the top 10 of HN at any given time, and there's a very high chance that the top upvoted comment is either FUD or overly critical. I feel like there is a lot more ego here than in /r/programming.

Believe it or not, some of us aren't on Reddit.

Are these r/ references to Reddit? I had thought it was yet another new quirky unneeded programming language I had intentionally avoided to learn.

yes. reddit.com is a community site made up of sub-communities called subreddits. Subreddits have a path of /r/<community name>.